The Agency
by HAWTgeek
Summary: Percy was eighteen when he got kidnapped to join an elite task force for Demigods as Noah Harrison, where it is always just about the mission.Ten years later,you'd never know he was Percy Jackson. But his past is coming to haunt him when Annabeth joins the agency and is announced to be his new partner...
1. Chapter 1

I stared at Annabeth, who was unconscious in a hospital bed, and, for the first time in ten years, I prayed.

I had said things like _please don't let me die! _but that just came in my line of work. I hadn't forgiven the gods for letting my past happen, especially the kidnapping. I didn't even pray to my father. Sure, I threw some food into the fire for him, but I still held a grudge again the Sea God.

But that didn't matter at that moment.

I prayed to every god, including the minors, a true prayer. I prayed that Annabeth would be able to scream at me and be so angry that she could just kill me again. She could never speak to me again, but I didn't care as long as she was alive. I would trade in my job, which I've come to love, for her safety. I never wanted her getting this job. It was too dangerous.

The agency hadn't been busy for a while, and neither of us had been in danger. I had been so thankful of that until the day I got this assignment. I had been working there since the day when I was eighteen and they brought me here. I wasn't given a choice for the last ten years, but, once that was up, I was given a choice. But I didn't take it. My job was all I had in my life at that point.

On my eighteenth birthday, I stayed up until midnight, talking to Annabeth on the phone. When she hung up, claiming her dorm advisor would be pissed if Annabeth didn't, I told her I'd call her that morning, but I never got the chance. I fell asleep, and I woke up in a metal room with a table and a woman in her mid-twenties sitting at the other side. She told me about what happened. She told me what would happen in my future, and I hated it all. I fought for a year, wanting to get back to Annabeth and my old life. Then, I saw Annabeth again. It was from a distance while I was on a mission, and I realized she was better without me. My job gained me some enemies, and I couldn't live with myself if I put her in danger.

So, I let go. I worked until I was the best at my job, and the agency began to trust me, giving me the option to move out of the safe-house if I wanted to, but I didn't. I worked in the dangerous cities for years until I was given a promotion down south. I would work higher class cases and get a higher paycheck. So, I moved down to a nice, quiet beach in North Carolina. Surprisingly, the agency was run out of there, and, even better, they paid all of my expenses and for the million dollar beach house on the shore.

No one could recognize me as Percy Jackson. My usual green eyes were chocolate brown, and I dressed completely differently. My Bieber-like black hair was also brown and perfectly cropped, reminding me of a teacher I knew at the agency. Everything about me was different, except for the tattoo on my arm and the scar on my back from the Achilles Heel.

But I didn't look like that now. All of the brown had been washed out of my hair until I had pitch black hair again, and I hadn't gotten around to cutting it in a while. I took out my contacts, and I was wearing a Camp Half-Blood tee shirt. I felt like Percy Jackson, not my alias Noah Harrison.

For the last five years, I hadn't cared that I didn't even know the name of the place I worked for and was forced to call it the 'agency'. I hadn't cared that I spent just about every night alone. I hadn't cared that I hid my pictures of when I was Percy Jackson in my closet under a bunch of sweaters I hate.

I simply didn't care.

Then I got a new partner…

_**A Few Months Earlier:**_

_**Annabeth:**_

I scanned through the file I had been given on arrival to JFK, where I took a private jet out to North Carolina.

I was eighteen when my boyfriend went missing, and I hadn't gotten over it. Instead, I threw myself into my work. After finishing Olympus, I got tired of that and went on to a new challenge. I was twenty three when I got the offer to join an elite task force, made specifically for Demigods.

We didn't have an office like the FBI.

I logged onto a special email service, which is un-hack-able, and got my assignments. I did that for five years when I got an offer to go to North Carolina, which is where the Agency is ran out of. The legit business is an airplane company which rivals with Delta and stuff like that. This upgrade offered a higher pay and a harder job, which are my two favorite things.

In Boston, I was myself. But, while I had the same name, I wasn't the same person in North Carolina.

My mom died in childbirth, and I have a phobia of it due to that. My dad is a college professor, which he actually is, but I loved my Step Mother. I never ran away from home but got into an elite school when I was a child. I was very close to my father, and I had a thing for the idea of flight. I hate chocolate more than anything, and I was a pilot for about three months. Then, I started working in the company, and I've worked myself up. I am close friends with Noah Harrison, who I am sharing a deluxe home on the shore with. We met at a work fundraiser and became fast friends. I have commitment phobia because of my last relationship. I was staying with my sister while my apartment was being remodeled, and I came in to check on it. And the only thing being nailed was my fiancé.

"Noah will be your partner. You will work assignments together, which is why you two will be living together," Anna Holmes, if that was her real name, told me across her desk. My flight got in an hour ago, and the car the agency gave me was waiting at the airport. The GPS was set to go here, and I did. It was the main center for Zeus Airways, and I went first to the seventh floor before taking the secret elevator to the basement, where these talks were always to take place.

"Now, we just need some last minute questions," Anna smiled as she brought out a thin tablet.

"Do you smoke?"

"No."

She made a check with the stylus.

"Have you ever lived with a smoker?"

"My half-sister and roommate until now used to smoke before quitting two years ago."

Another check.

"Are you close with your godly-half-siblings?"

"Yes, all of them."

Another check.

"Are you able to keep up a stable romantic relationship?"

I took a deep breath. This was a question I knew she would have to ask. I was asked it when I came to the Agency, and this was probably about the same importance. But it still hurt to think about. Images of Percy Jackson, my ex, filled my mind.

Technically, we never broke up, but he disappeared ten years ago, the day after his eighteenth birthday. It had been a decade. He wasn't coming back, but I still found myself hoping. I can't stay with a guy because I'm still in love with Percy Jackson.

No one's like him…

_I watched as the rain angrily slapped against the cabin windows. I was caught in Percy's cabin, not that I would want it any other way. The end of the summer was coming soon, and we'll be seniors after that. Finally, I didn't have a roommate, which meant I could call Percy all night without getting a shoe thrown at me. Plus, the security sucks there. All I need to do is cross a few wires, and I can have Percy come up whenever I want. _

"_You okay?" Percy sat down on the hardwood floors beside me, wrapping his arm around my shoulder. I looked up from staring at the windows, and I instinctively stopped hugging my knees to straighten my spine. _

_I hadn't been okay .The sight of rain pouring down a window pane like blood from newly slit skin made me want to cry into Percy's perfectly toned chest. But, the moment he's around me, I become like a giddy little school girl. My lips formed a smile that was wide enough to remind me of those dumb cartoon characters who look like they need professional help from smiling so damn much._

"_Yea, Perce. Just thinking," I rested my head on Percy's chest and closed my eyes for a brief moment to let the peace and greatness of this moment set in._

"_About?" Percy tightened his grip on me protectively. _

"_Camp. School. _You_," I smiled at the last one._

"_And?"_

"And_," I smirked, "I was thinking about our past…"_

"_I was thinking about you, but not our past…"_

"_What then?" I stared up into his sea green eyes like a little kid listening to their father tell them a story._

"_How much I love you," Percy leaned down to kiss me._

"No," I finally answered.

* * *

><p>I took the keys out of the ignition and looked at myself in the car mirror.<p>

My eyes were still grey, and I looked exactly the same as I did when I was a kid. Well, other than how my hair was short and had been professionally straightened. But I didn't feel like Annabeth Chase. I hadn't in ten years. I forgot how it felt to be her, which was the worst part.

I forced my mind off of that and grabbed my purse from the passenger seat. Clothes had been delivered for me, and personal things I needed had also been sent before me. All I had to do was put the key in the lock and I lived here. The place was beautiful, like one of those houses that you wonder what kind of people live there as you drive away. Noah, my new partner, was inside, ready to get our stories straight. I knew that his BMW X5 was sitting in the garage (my bio stated that I hated parking in garages, and he loved it), and I also knew that he would be sitting in the living room, which was the first thing you went into, with a pizza on the coffee table (Beef deep dish, my alias's and my favorite). My stomach growled from how I hadn't eaten all day.

I got out of the car, taking the pre-stocked purse with me. It held things girls need, like cash and three credit cards (one for work use and two for personal). My assignments usually went like that, or at least the ones that took a long time. I was given a gun, a wallet, clothes, and a room. But this was going to be harder than any job I had done.

I couldn't just get in a car and drive away when I'm done. This is my life now, even if I don't want it to be. Shaking off the thought, I focused on how hard it was to walk in my Chanel heels. Heels had always been my forte, but these were like walking in a ball gown on a tightrope.

The key slid into the lock with ease, and I was surprised by that. Every safe house I had ever gone to had a security system that was even better than a bank. But I guess I was expected. The front door was heavier than plain mahogany. Maybe fifty pounds of steel or more.

The inside was beachy chic and probably costed more than the first five years I earned. The pizza was sitting on the coffee table, and a tall man lounged on a white sofa. Shock registered through his brown eyes, and there was something familiar about him. His features were prominent, but they were masked to try to seem normal. Noah's brown hair was perfectly colored, but I knew it was fake by small tip offs, as well as his eyes.

"Noah Harrison?"

Noah shook off his surprise and nodded.

"Annabeth Chase," his voice was cool and melodic, like many of the Agents I had met over the years, but his seemed forced.

There was something about him. I don't know what it was. It wasn't his looks, definitely not. It was his voice. It was his atmosphere. It was something 'Percy' about him, and I began to wonder who he really was. Some agents get caught and have to start all over.

I forced my hopes back down. He wasn't Percy.

Percy was gone.

_**This is just a pilot. I don't know if I want to continue it since I suck with action :(**_


	2. Chapter 2

_**Annabeth:**_

I woke up to the sound of my alarm clock ringing until I could have killed the damn thing, but I got up none the less. I spent the entire day before brushing up on the live I apparently lived and the one that Noah lived. I didn't know his real story, and he didn't know mine. But we knew the alias by heart now.

Noah was born in New York City with his single dad how was often busy as he was a lawyer. Noah's mom died when he was seven, and she had been sick his whole life. His dad is dead, too, and he died in a car wreck when Noah was twenty two. Noah had just finished college, but he ditched law school, like he had planned because it reminded it too much for his dad. He went to Zeus Airlines, and he's worked his way up for the last six years. He moved here two years ago, and he never goes on the second floor because he was dating some girl down there and told her that she was too needy. Then all of the 'needy' girls trashed his office.

Noah worked on the seventh floor with me, in the office beside mine. We oversaw the entire company and had to go on 'business' trips all of the time. Of course, we never actually did anything. That was for the people on the sixth floor. We ran the real company behind Zeus Airlines.

I didn't have to head into work until nine thirty this morning, which was a blessing. But I was still used to waking up at six am for training and my roommate's constant music playing to keep her awake so she could get to work on time.

I buttoned my blazer and looked at myself in the mirror.

I had the body everyone dreams of, or at least I did when I was a teenager, but I eat like a pig. Just one of my training exercises once a year could get you at your goal weight, but I did it five days a week. I knew I was supposed to be proud of it all, but there were times where I felt like just crying about it.

_The _real _Annabeth wouldn't look like this…_

I brushed off the thought and remembered that the 'real' Annabeth went missing with Perseus ten years ago. Forcing my hair into what ponytail I could manage with my short hair, I started to walk downstairs. I didn't know what I was going to do. I guess I could call my friends back in New York as it would be later in the morning there. My stilettos clacked against the hardwood floors as I came down the stairs to the modern space below. I didn't glance at the door that led to Noah's room.

He wasn't that bad. We weren't best friend or anything, but we understood. We understood what it's like to know that the last person you slept with was for a mission. We knew what it felt like to go to sleep alone and stare at the ceiling, knowing that there isn't someone beside you and that there won't be. We miss important events because we have to work. We almost die every day, and we can't do anything about it. We can't even tell anyone.

Understanding is what we have going on, and it might be the only thing we'll ever have going on.

"You're up," Noah's voice shocked me. I turned around from where I was looking at the ocean through the large windows by the living room. Noah stood in the middle of the open kitchen, holding a steaming cup of coffee. He wore a suit that was simple and forgettable, just like him. But there was something about him that made him different. Maybe it was just what I knew about him, but it was there.

I quickly snapped myself out of it and went back to the question he had just asked me, not that it really was a question. He spoke like it was a simple statement, which it really was. I _was_ up, and so was he.

"Couldn't sleep," I shrugged with a gentle-fake- smile that I had mastered over the years, "What about you?"

"I didn't finish some things yesterday, and I need to talk to Anna about something."

I knew he was speaking of Anna Holmes, and I knew this something he was also speaking of was _me_.

I nodded, and his eyes told me that he knew I was aware of _exactly_ what he was talking about.

_**I wasn't going to do another Percy POV, but screw it. **_

_**Percy:**_

I looked at the name on the glass door.

_Anna Holmes, Head of Human Recourses_

I was on level B-2, where everything 'Agency' wise was run. Anna's door was the first one you saw naturally.

I remembered the day I came here. I was on level B-5 here, in an interrogation room. My head hurt, and I was handcuffed in steel beyond my strength. I was still wearing my Simpsons pajamas and a 'Goode High' tee shirt. My head banged from being drugged, and the cold metal chilled my skin.

Anna Holmes smiled at me. Her black hair was in a high ponytail, and her dark brown eyes stared at me. She was about nine years older than me, but she acted like she was my mother's age. She wore a crisp business suit, and she looked like she just drank ten Redbulls.

I tried to fight the cuffs but nothing happened. She tisked and told me that it wouldn't do a damn thing, which she was right about. After ten minutes of me trying to escape unsuccessfully, she explained what happened and would happen. Anna flew with me to Chicago, where she kept a close eye on me and became like my mom. That was wear I saw Annabeth again as she was walking down the street to visit some college. I remember everything about that moment, too.

I was wearing blonde wig, looking out a window of a crowded coffee shop. I sipped at a strong black coffee and looked into the backpack Anna gave me for my first assignment alone. For an odd reason, I looked up from the bag back out to the window. There she stood, her blonde curls cascading down her back. She wore a 'New York City' baseball cap, and a tee shirt for the boarding school she went to. She stood with two other girls, one I knew as her old roommate from her first year at the school but I didn't know the other one. They looked at the coffee shop from outside as if deciding if they wanted to go in. For a moment, I swear that her grey eyes looked into mine. Then her friend brought out her iphone and looked at them with complete seriousness. Annabeth's eyes shifted back to her, and they ran out of my sight. And I was too shocked to run after her.

I shook off the thoughts and peered through the glass and saw that Anna was alone. I didn't bother to knock because I knew her too well to have to do that. She was like my mother. Honestly, she _was_ my mom after I hadn't seen my biological mom in so long that I had almost forgotten about her.

_Almost._

"Percy," she smiled as she looked up from her paperwork. Her long black hair swept down her back and flew in the air conditioning. Her smile was gentle, and her brown eyes reminded me of a Hershey's chocolate bar after a bad day. Anna was almost forty and had a child of her own, not like how I was which was a metaphorical son. Three years ago, she settled down with a fellow coworker here, and they had a child, Tony. It was hard to think of her as pregnant after I saw her scale buildings without anyone but me noticing.

Usually, I would start a conversation, but I wasn't in that mood.

"Annabeth is my partner."

"Yes, yes, she is," Anna set her arms on the table and leaned over to put most of her weight onto them.

"You don't know who she is?" I knit my eyebrows in confusion, knowing I had told her a million times about her.

"She's one of our best agents. It's amazing how young and successful she is. You should be happy to have someone so great who can help keep you alive. I made sure you had the best," Anna smiled.

"Anna," I sat down in a nearby seat, "Do you remember the day I came to you for the first time?"

"Yeah, you kept talking about your…" Anna trailed off, her eyes wide from shock. She gasped and raised a hand to her thin lips, "Oh my gods."

I nodded, feeling the exact same way.

"Are you okay, Sweetie?" Anna reached over her desk to set a comforting hand on my arm, "Do you need me to get rid of her?"

I stared into Anna's eyes, and I quickly shook my head. Sure, this was totally hell, but it wasn't like I could do a damn thing about it. I spent forever searching for her. Just because I couldn't have her didn't mean I didn't want her beside me, especially after what I went through for her.

I felt my heart speed up at the thought of how much I still missed Annabeth, even though she was currently in my house not knowing it's me.

Anna's pager beeped, and I knew it meant she had a meeting, meaning I had to live.

"I have to go, Baby. But I'll see you soon," she smiled the 'Mom' smile, reminding me of the life I had.

I spent my senior year being watched so I didn't make a run for it. I went to college with my teachers being ex-spies. I spent my twenty-first birthday driving to my next mission. My forty year old boss was the closest thing I had for a mother for the last decade. I haven't been in a serious relationship since I was eighteen, and I don't really have any friends as I wouldn't want to endanger them.

I began to wonder what life Annabeth had, and I almost cried at the thought.

We both got up, and she reached for tablet from her drawer as I opened the glass door to leave. I was about to leave when I hear Anna's voice from behind me.

"You can tell her, if you want."

I turned around in surprise.

I couldn't tell her. I was legally bound not to tell her that I was Percy Jackson. I signed a contract, and, if I violate it, they have every right to take my job, my life, _everything_ if they chose to. I've been told that time after time, especially by Anna, but she was telling me the exact opposite.

"I can't," I shook my head, knowing that it was sadly true. Contract or no contract, I couldn't do that to her.

"I understand," she nodded sympathetically.

_**Weird, eh? Just keep reading.**_

_**Annabeth:**_

I reviewed our watch list for the agency.

Most were high class bluebloods used to the million dollar life style I had just been inducted to. There was one demigod, Ron, who was known for hating the gods and starting trouble. A few were just mad men who _everyone_ was watching to make sure they didn't blow up the planet.

I felt bored beyond belief. It was my first day, true, but I hoped for more than this. On my first day in the agency, I got into a shootout with a woman trying to assonate the president. After that, I had normal days where I just lounged around and trained while waiting for another assignment, but this was simply ridiculous. Here, I had to look busy even though I wanted to fall asleep. Through the glass walls, I could see Noah working on his computer as if he was the busiest man in the company.

I exited the watch list and went to the global positioning device that could find anyone. I first typed in 'Grover' and found that he was at camp, which meant he wouldn't answer his phone if I called him now. I typed in another name.

'_Percy Jackson Not Found'_ blinked on the computer screen like an insult.

Every time I typed in his name, it said that. I typed in all of his names. The name he was born as. The name he had until his mom divorced Gabe. And all of that. It never once came through no matter how hard I tried.

The alert for an email came through, shaking me out of my thoughts. I pressed the icon to take me to it, and I began to pray that it was a mission to get me out of this hell hole.

_I was bored when I first got here, too. A mission will come through any day now._

_-Noah Harrison_

I ignored the sigh building in my throat and typed back a response that was like a thanks or something. I didn't really pay attention. Instead, I pressed the send button and watched him read it out of the corner of my eye. Before heading back to the database, I checked to see if I had anything else to do.

Nada.

I was about to type in 'Percy Jackson' when my phone rang to let me know it was time for lunch.

_**Five O'Clock:**_

I checked the time again.

I was allowed to leave now as my hours were over, and I wanted to call Grover and see how he was doing. He and Juniper just had twins, Sebastian and Daphne, and I loved them as if they were my own kids. They started daycare soon, and I wanted to see how Juniper was since she had been wailing that she couldn't imagine her little kids were all grown up for weeks before I left.

Logging out of the Agency's database and clocking out, the boring work day seemed to be over, which was a huge relief. My feet were basically begging to take off the stilettos and fall asleep on the insanely soft bed in the safe house. My stomach growling from eating only a salad at lunch, I began to put my stuff in my purse.

It was the simply stuff that I was allowed to take home like my work cell phone, a tablet with the watchlist already programmed in under a password that barely even I knew, an insanely small gun, and my lucky dagger.

I grabbed the car keys for the black sedan the agency gave me, and I was about to make a run for it when I saw Noah at the glass door. Seeing I wasn't busy or anything, he came in, carrying two folders. He sat one down on the table without a word, and my heart sped with excitement.

_Finally!_

"It just came in, and it's only a small assignment. We leave in the morning for Columbia. All we need to do is get a few pictures," Noah told me in an 'all-serious' tone. I couldn't hide my smile, even though I tried so very hard.

"Driving?"

"Seven AM. Check-in is at eleven," Noah nodded with a smile. I reached for the folder and pulled it open.

"Um, one last thing."

I looked up at him to continue.

Noah reached into his folder and brought out a little baggie.

"We're married," he nodded towards the gold band inside of the bag.

I shifted through the papers in the file and brought out a similar baggie with two rings inside.

_Wedding Rings._

I didn't know what to say. This was a small mission and would take three days top. I knew people got these kinds of missions all the time. It was one of those facts of life when you work here. But I knew it would be awkward since we did just meet.

"Got it," I forced the words off my tongue, even though it felt impossible.

"I better get going. See you at home?" Noah asked, and I nodded, knowing I now wanted to wait before heading back to the safe house even if it did have a nice warm bed and I was tired. Noah nodded as well before he began to leave the glass room. I watched him leave, feeling something familiar about that moment.

Once I saw him go down the elevator, I forced my eyes down to the file and remembered something Noah told me that I needed to know if I was going to keep this job.

Our alibi and aliases are more important than any weapon we could ever have.

_**Okay, so I promise it'll be better. And, no, this isn't the mission where they have the hospital scene at the end. This is just the first mission. I'm not exactly used to this. If you have read any of my other stories, you would see that I'm flying blind here. Well, I have to get back to the Orlando sun. By the way, I found out a secret of life that no one tells you. Go to Orlando in early December. No lines at the amusement parks. The sun is sweet, and it's the perfect temperature. Other times? I'm burning while standing in a long line for It's a Small World with kids screaming and my mom complaining because she's claustrophobic. **_


	3. Chapter 3

_**Annabeth:**_

I read the file again, going over the story.

I was married to Noah.

It was our second anniversary, making us return to the place we met.

I was happy to finally have a job instead of working in the boring North Carolina beach, but it wasn't like this was too much better after scaling buildings had been a regular occurrence. Noah was driving, and I definitely had to admit that he was a much better driver than me.

When I took the job, driving was always important. But you didn't need to be a _good_ driver. In fact, you needed to be an awful driver. Good drivers can't drive down a rocky hill and land perfectly on an interstate. But _bad_ drivers can.

Noah's driving was something that reminded me of what my teacher who taught me how to drive was dreaming of. He was everything that people want. Perfect agent. Probably perfect student and friend. And he looked great, too.

Last night, I could smell the strong dye throughout t/he house, but I didn't give much of a thought to it. Now, I saw that Noah's hair was a perfect, crisp brown. Noah's brown eyes looked a little more realistic, and he was dressed in the perfect outfit for this. There was nothing too memorable about him, but there was nothing forgettable about him, in my opinion. Knowing it wouldn't be long until I would be staring at Noah, I looked back at my folder.

"Don't you think you've read it enough times?" Noah didn't even look away from the road to me when he spoke.

"Just last night, you said I needed to know this," I tried not to look up like he did, but it was kind of hard.

"Touché."

Noah took a turn.

"You don't talk much, do you?" I abandoned my folder to look at him. I closed it and left it on my lap, and Noah _still _didn't look at me.

"I talk," Noah shrugged, and I continued to stare at him.

"Not _much_."

"Why do you care about how much I talk?" Noah looked at me for the first time for the entire car ride.

_Score one for Annabeth!_

"I don't. I'm just noticing it, and, now that I'm thinking about it, we've never spoken about anything not-work related," I continued to stare at him.

"What about this?"

"_This_ doesn't count," I kept wanting him to say something that would give him something. A personality or a past or something.

I didn't know anything about Noah. At least, I gave him hints about me like my father's name. He gave me nothing. He didn't slip up. _Ever_. I didn't know a damn thing about him or anything. Noah was like a full-time agent who was never not on an assignment. I tried to be myself when I was with him as he was truly the only person I could be myself with, but he didn't seem to care. He didn't stop me from being me, but he definitely wasn't himself.

"Well what do you want to talk about?" Noah continued to drive.

"I don't know. Your past. Your personality. Your interest. I feel like I'm just talking all the time," I crossed my arms over a grey blouse and continued to stare at him, and, as I did, I noticed the small things about him that he tried to hide.

He was six feet three from afar, but six four nearby. His cheekbones were high set but not in a pretty-boy way. Noah's jaw was tightened like he was forever upset about something, and his eyes seemed pain. But I couldn't tell too well as his eyes were really covered by contacts.

"_All of it_?"

"Preferably, but whatever you prefer," I shrugged.

"Okay, my dad left before I was born. I've been tol.d I'm too loyal. And I like to cook thanks to Anna, who's been helping me since I joined," Noah shrugged, and I shook off the familiarity.

"When did you join?" I asked, suddenly really wanting to know.

"Eighteen," Noah's jaw tightened even more. His brown eyes stared at the highway like tears were coming on, but he pulled it back before I could be sure. I bit my lip not to bring up that this is the most intimate conversation we've ever had.

For years, I didn't give a damn that I didn't have any friends or anything, but I suddenly cared now. I wanted to be friends with him to such an extent that it almost hurt my stomach. I didn't know what it was about him. Maybe it was the fact that he clearly didn't want me that made me want him. But I did know that I wanted him to talk and he wanted me to shut up.

About fifteen minutes passed until I was staring out the window and had forgotten about the conversations.

"I just realized something," Noah spoke, snapping me out of my thoughts.

"What?"

"You shut up," Noah smiled, turning his attention to me. I stared at him, and my lips unwillingly formed a smile. Finally, after the shock finished registering, I shoved Noah.

"Hey, no shoving the driver!" Noah smiled.

"You and I both know that saying that makes me want to shove you again," I crossed my arms again.

"With all the talking you've done in the last few days, I _know_," Noah smirked, and I shoved him again.

"Didn't we just have this conversation?"

"Yeah, then you went and became an ass. It's not my fault," I smirked. I could tell Noah wanted to say something but quickly stopped himself. I stared at him again, not able to look away.

"Why are you _always_ staring at me?"

"I don't know. You're just…" I trialed off, and Noah nodded to urge me to continue.

"You don't talk about anything. Then you're talking. You look so stuffy that I'm weighing my options of going back to being locked up in a cellar in the Ukraine. Then you're laughing. It's almost as confusing as _Lost_," I complained, and Noah just looked at me for a second before turning his eyes back to the road.

"Oh and you're not?"

"Like what?"

"You keep up your alibi. Then you act like yourself. You seem guarded. Then you're not. You watch things with a painful glance like it reminds you of things. Then you don't. You call your friends and act like you miss them, and then you kind of forget them. So, either you're just as weird as me or some guy screwed you up."

I looked at him, deciding how I should respond.

"Both."

He looked at me for a moment, and I held his gaze to Noah's surprise.

"A girl ruined me, too," he nodded, and I knew he wasn't going to tell me about her. Maybe in a year or two, but he definitely wouldn't now. I'd be easier with telling him about Percy, but it would be a while for him.

I walked through the casino, with Noah on my arm.

"There he is," Noah's warm breath whispered into my ear, and I almost shivered.

I glanced at the direction Noah was talking about.

A short man stood at the blackjack table, and I wasn't surprised at all. His skin was spray-tan fresh, and his face had terrible botox. His hair was newly jet black, but there were a few grey streaks. The suit he was wearing was fresh from the Armani store. His Italian leather shoes probably cost more than my tuition to Harvard, and he was flirting up some blonde beside him.

"What do I need to do again?" I whispered, suddenly scared and worried that I would get it wrong.

"Get the lighter from his back pocket."

I stared at him.

"Excuse me?"

"Let's get a drink," Noah steered me to the bar.

"Two Mojitos"

The bartender went to prepare the drinks, leaving Nosh and I alone.

The casino wasn't very busy, and the bar was even less busy. There was maybe one more person, but they were a few barstools away, talking up a girl.

"How did you know I like mojitos?"

Noah froze.

"Wild guess," Noah shrugged.

The bartender handed us the drinks, and we waited until he was gone to keep talking.

"Now, what the hell about the lighter in the back pocket thing?" I whisper-hissed.

"Listen, there is a code on the lighter. We have the program, but we can't get it without the code. It's on the gold lighter."

"How am I supposed to get it?"

"I don't know. He's so busy with the girl, he probably wont even notice."

"He has a lighter that agencies around the world are trying to get it. I think he'll notice," I hissed.

"Listen, Annabeth, walk past him, pretend to run into him or something. Just get the lighter."

"I hate you," I downed my drink.

"Just go."

I got off my barstool and left what little mojito I had left in my glass.

My red heels clacked on the floors, but I couldn't hear them over the casino's noises. I was sent with a red knee-length dress that hugged my heels, and I'm not sure if Noah packed it or if it was just packed for me. All I do know is that I was wearing it.

The young thing that had been standing next to Marcel went to get herself a pretty little umbrella drink while I went up there. I bit my tongue as I forcibly ran into the fifties-or-so-man and slid out the golden lighter from his back pocket.

He shook a little, completely scared.

"Oh my god!" I apologized, raising my hands to my lips to show how sorry I was, "I am so, so, so sorry."

"It's fine," he chuckled a little bit, and I realized with horror that he probably thought I was flirting with him.

"I really am sorry. I just can't seem to think straight today," I apologized.

"You here alone?"

I bit my tongue not to hit him, and I raised my hand to show a golden wedding band.

"Anniversary. We met in this town," I smiled wide.

"Congratulations. You better get back to him," Marcel clearly didn't give a damn about me after he found out I was married.

"You're right. I really am sorry, by the way," I wheeled around to head back to Noah. He was smiling brightly, and he ordered two more mojitos as I walked up.

"See how easy that was?" Noah smiled, and I shoved the golden lighter at him.

"I hate you," I smiled.

"No you don't," he smiled, too.

"I can't believe I didn't screw up," I continued, "I mean, I know this was a small assignment, but I was so scared."

"I was scared on my first job when I got promoted, too," Noah stopped talking when the bartender brought out two more mojitos, and he handed me one.

"To Annabeth."

"To Noah."

The Next Morning:

I groaned in my sleep and turned over.

As I groggily woke up, I found that I was still in the red dress, and Noah was passed out beside me, also wearing the same thing he had on last night. When my head started banging and my memory from midnight until 3 AM become cloudy, I knew we had been drunk. I remembered coming in here and talking for what felt like hours. Then, I blacked out after another drink.

I shoved Noah.

"I'll be up in a few minutes."

I shoved him again.

He groaned.

"Let me sleep."

"Wake up, Noah."

"No."

"Get up."

He turned over, and I reached for the phone.

"I'll get you coffee."

Noah flipped over as if the offer was tempting, which I guess it was.

"Fine," he sat up.

I ordered to coffees and a small breakfast as I assessed what time the clock said.

Nine.

We had to be out in about two hours.

Before Noah went into the shower, I got a cup of water and swallowed an Advil to help my migraine. The second he saw the bottle, he also took one. Then he was off to the shower, and I was changing into jeans and a V-Neck sweater. I was whipping my make-up smeared face with a wet wipe when Noah came out of the bathroom, wearing only jeans for some weird reason.

"If it isn't Mr. Whiney-Ass himself," I smirked, and he ruffled his soaking wet hair.

"At least I had less than you last night," he smirked as he pulled a blue tee shirt over his jeans, to my dismay.

"You did not," I told him indignity.

"Yes you did," he smirked, and I glared at him, then I realized something.

We were…friends.

He was laughing.

And talking.

"Are you realizing something?"

"What?" he asked, clearly not getting what I was talking about.

"You're talking without me having to order you to."

"I guess I am," Noah shrugged, and someone knocked on the door.

"Room service!" they called out.

_**Okay, I know it too long to update, but I've been really busy, not that there is much of an excuse. Anyway, here it is. I know it wasn't too good or anything, but I'm working on it. Finals and Christmas has just been a pain in the ass.**_


	4. Chapter 4

_**Annabeth:**_

I flit through the icons on my computer screen.

One new email from Grover, probably a picture of the twins.

One new calendar alert, most likely about my plan to get Noah to open up to me about the girl who ruined him (today was gently easing into the subject. Yesterday was talking about the guy who ruined me, AKA Percy Jackson)

And three new people on the watch list.

None of that interested me though.

Instead, my eyes kept wandering to Noah, who was sitting on the couch across from me. His dark brown eyes were reading the New York Times intently, as if he didn't even notice that I was exactly ten feet away from him (Yes, I _counted_).

He _used_ to notice twenty-four-seven, but, now , it's like he's _trying_ not to.

"What, Annabeth?" Noah didn't take his eyes off his newspaper.

"I'm just wondering what was on that lighter."

"_What_?" he set the newspaper down beside him.

"Have you never wondered what you did on your assignments? I mean, we're never really told."

Noah stared at me for a moment, probably not sure what to say. I liked his eyes. Sure, they were fake, and I had never seen his _real_ eyes, but I still liked them. They made me feel safe, and they made that loneliness I had endured for years go away. For the millionth time, I wondered what he really looked like. I wondered what color his hair and eyes were.

"I guess it's none of our business," Noah shrugged, still a little caught off guard.

"But don't you ever care. I mean, someone could be dying right now because of us."

"Your file says you were a hit man for almost a year."

"_Still_," I complained.

"I don't know. I'm just a messenger, and finding out what I'm delivering isn't part of t the deal. Besides, I don't need _more_ trouble, and that's what you get from trying to find out things like that. This is just the job," Noah shrugged again, but I could see he didn't believe it.

"Why'd you join?"

"_What_?"

"I joined this job because I had nothing left. But I was twenty-five. What happened when you were eighteen?"

Noah lowered his eyes and paused for a long moment.

"I wasn't given much of a choice."

I was about to continue when he quickly changed the subject.

"I'm going to go shooting. Wanna come?"

I waited, not sure if he would keep talking if I did. I didn't know what it was with Noah. He never spoke about his past, even if I basically forced it out of him. He just wouldn't talk, and I didn't like losing. _Like ever._

"Sure," I closed my laptop and set it down on the floor. I followed him down to the white-door that looked like it just led off to a hall. We didn't really speak as we descended the stairs down to the basement.

We came to a lounge-like spot that Noah liked. This is where he likes to come, and I like to go out to the glass room where you can see the ocean lap on the beach. Three doors led off from the living-room. The first from the right led to Noah's office, and the one next to it went to the bathroom. The final and least noticeable was my absolute favorite in the entire house.

He opened the door first and it was like a small coat closet. Noah took out his key and jammed it into the lock while I slid out of my blazer and hung it up.

Noah pulled open the heavy-sound-proof door, and I smiled to myself.

A few minutes later, I was taking aim at a human-size target.

I shot a few rounds into the head earlier, watching as Noah did the same to his target, and I was reloading.

"So, why'd you join, Annabeth?"

I stared at him.

"_What_?"

"I mean, you're so inquisitive. _And_ you had a choice."

"What do you mean?"

"You just don't seem like the Agency type," he shrugged as he took a shot at the target's heart.

"How?" I set my gun down on the sidebar and looked at him.

"You just don't."

Another shot to the target's heart.

"Explain," I gently took the gun from his hands and set it down on the sidebar beside me, getting fed up as to how he was avoiding a conversation he started.

"You're stubborn, you know that," he stared at me, and I simply shrugged.

"Yeah, I know."

"Fine. What I was saying is that you're too curious for this job. And you don't seem like the type to be okay with risking your life daily for something that you don't even know the name of."

I stared into his brown eyes, and my voice faltered.

I didn't even know the name of the Agency I worked for the last five years. I've almost died, and I've _killed_ for this job. But I don't know the _name_?

"Don't you agree?" Noah crossed his arms, and I picked up his handgun and handed it back to him.

Before he could respond, I grabbed my gun and shot a round to the heart of my target.

Noah got the message and didn't speak again.

_**XXXXXXX**_

I glanced at the office beside mine and saw that Noah was still at his meeting with Anna on B-2.

I wondered what they were talking about. Some days, I still worried that he was going down there to get rid of me. There was something about Noah. Well, a lot of things. Like how he always seems to have a secret. Or how he talks without really saying anything. Or how he doesn't care that he doesn't even know why he's risking his life for information. Or how he makes me want to throw a vase at him when he outsmarts me.

What? I like being right.

Anyway…

Without realizing it, I typed 'Percy Jackson' into the search bar and pressed enter.

_**Nothing Found in Agency.**_

_**Outside of Agency…**_

A few newspaper articles showed Percy. The first I saw was when he was wanted during our first quest. Most of them went on like that until I reached the last.

The one that I had read a million times.

_Percy Jackson went missing in his home the night after his eighteenth birthday. The last he was heard of was when he called his girlfriend to say goodnight, and he was gone by morning. There was no sign of forced entry or of him just leaving. _

They showed a picture of him.

I remembered taking it. About three weeks before he went missing, Percy was just in a good mood. He even kept a smile when I got mad and tipped our canoe during class that morning. At the camp fire, we all ditched the sitting together thing, and he had his arm slung around my shoulder. Everything was perfect about that moment. So, I took out my camera and turned to him. With the raging camp fire behind him, I snapped a photo.

As I stared at the picture, I felt something different.

Usually, I just felt pain and remorse, but there was something else that time.

I was trying to figure it out when I noticed the log beside the article.

_Written by Barbara Quinn. _

_Published August 22__nd__._

_Last seen by…_

My heart skipped a beat.

_Noah Harrison at 3:11_

Thirty minutes ago.

Just as I read that, Noah opened his office door and walked in. He waved like a friend and smiled, but I didn't smile back. Instead, I went to my email and typed furiously.

_To: Noah Harrison_

_From: Annabeth Chase_

_Why are you looking at the article about when Percy Jackson went missing?_

I waited as Noah sat down to his computer and opened the email application, and I swear his tan skin paled.

_**Okay, I'm just going to need to warn you. It's going to be a while until Annabeth finds out about Noah=Percy. Anyway, HAPPY NEW YEAR! Ugh, tried Champaign for the first time and feel like dying… Speaking of dying, it's 2012! You know, my dad and I were talking about how his dad was on New Years Eve when he was a kid, and it's pretty depressing. For decades, he's gone around complaining that he won't celebrate because it's just another year closer to death. That's a downer, huh?**_

_**Oh, and I am begging you to see my youtube story. It's sims, and it's kind of lame. I need pointers. PLEASE HELP ME!**_

_**:)**_

_**Well, I'm going to watch some horror movie from the eighties. So, HAPPY NEW YEAR!**_


	5. Chapter 5

_**Annabeth:**_

_To: Annabeth Chase_

_From: Noah Harrison_

_Excuse me?_

I narrowed my eyes at the computer screen.

_To: Noah Harrison_

_From: Annabeth Chase_

_Why. Were. You. Looking. At. An article about. Percy. Jackson. Disappearing?_

It didn't take long until he responded.

_To: Annabeth Chase_

_From: Noah Harrison_

_Well, you mentioned that you two dated, and I simply looked it up. I didn't know what I'd find._

I paused, unable to think.

I _hadn't _mentioned Percy's name.

_To: Noah Harrison_

_From: Annabeth Chase_

_No I didn't._

I pressed the send button and looked over at Noah through the glass walls. His brown eyes read the email time and time again, but he wouldn't look in my direction. I continued to wait until my computer pinged with an email.

_To: Annabeth Chase_

_From: Anna Holmes_

_Need to see you in office. ASAP._

I glanced over at Noah, knowing that he had something to do with this. I picked up my security key and closed down the email application. As I walked through the door, I made sure not to look at Noah, though it was insanely hard. Instead, I went to the back elevator and waited for the door to close.

I pushed in my security key and looked at the little screen on the wall. It brought up the options of B-1, B-2, B-3, or B-4.

I quickly pressed B-2 and waited as the elevator went down the nine floors. When it opened, I saw Anna's door immediately as it was the first by the elevator.

She looked up from her computer and smiled at me. She waved me in, and I quickly followed directions.

"Annabeth, you look delightful," she smiled wider and motioned for me to sit, which I did.

Her dark brown hair was held up in a bun, and it was starting to fall out. Her suit was clean and crisp as always, and her tan was gentle. Her chocolate brown eyes were motherly, way more motherly than my mom's, and her teeth were newly bleached. Everything about her was what I had wished I would be when I was younger-and probably still did. I had never seen Anna without a smile, and I highly doubted that I ever would.

"Thank, you Ms. Holmes," I tried to smile.

"Oh, call me Anna. Now, about Noah," Anna quickly got back into business-mode, "I need to know, is he up to something?"

I stared at her for a moment.

"Excuse me?"

Sure, he was looking at the article about my ex's disappearance and stuff like that, but I didn't think he was about to commit treason or anything.

"Listen, Noah is like my son. I love him. And I know when something is wrong. But he just won't tell me. So, do you know anything that might be wrong?"

I continued to stare at her.

"Uh, I can't think of anything."

Anna nodded, her smile still there.

"Just checking. Noah is really great, but he always hides his emotions. It really is frustrating," Anna shrugged, "Oh and I almost forgot! You did great on your mission. You're a great Agent. Marcel actually thinks his one-night stand stole it. He's been searching everywhere for her."

Anna almost laughed.

"Thank you," I smiled lightly, wanting to get back to finding out why Noah was looking at the disappearance article.

"Annabeth," she looked down for a moment, "Don't be too hard on Noah. He's given up a lot for his job. Too much. There are some things he just can't tell you. And that's not his fault."

"I know," I lied.

_**Percy:**_

To: Annabeth Chase

From: Noah Harrison

I was looking at the article because it's about…me.

I was about to press send when my IM pinged.

_Anna Holmes: What happened with you and Annabeth? I think she knows something. Did you tell her?_

_Noah Harrison: She saw the log saying that I looked at the article about Percy's disappearance. What am I supposed to do?_

_Anna Holmes: You could tell her._

_Noah Harrison: This is not how I want to tell her. I mean, would you want to be told like this?_

_Anna Holmes: There isn't a good way for his. So…, if you're NOT going to tell her, think of something. Fast. She's on the elevator back up. _

As I finished reading it, the elevator opened with a certain blonde inside.

My heart stopped and I quickly looked down to the email. I deleted everything I had up to then, and I tried to think of something. I stared at the screen until my vision became blurry.

_Ping._

_To: Noah Harrison_

_From: Annabeth Chase_

_We're friends, right? Just tell me. I've told you everything. You owe me._

_-Anniebeth_

"Now she's playing dirty."

Anniebeth was Noah's version of Wise Girl. Well, she actually liked Wise Girl. Anniebeth just pisses her off, which is why I love to say it so much.

"_Wise Girl, wake up," I whispered, not wanting to scare her. Annabeth just wriggled closer to me and pushed her head back on my chest. Annabeth moaned and mumbled something like 'Five more minutes'._

_It was our second day on the boat. We would be in Greece in two days, and we didn't have much to do. Actually, our strict orders from Chiron were to relax so we wouldn't go crazy. Annabeth came over last night, and I guess she forgot to go back to her room the night before._

"_Annabeth," I shook her a little bit, and she continued to sleep. I looked down at her and smiled. I had barely left her side since the little reunion after me being gone for six months. I kissed the top of Annabeth's head and was about to go back to sleep when Annabeth stirred. She yawned and looked up at me, and a smile spread across her lips._

"_Hey, Sleepy Head. You know, until now, I had no clue how hard to wake up," I pushed her hair behind her ear and smiled._

"_About as hard as you are to wake up?" Annabeth raised an eyebrow._

"_Shut up, Anniebeth."_

"_Likewise, _Percybeth_," Annabeth pulled herself up to kiss me._

I stared at the screen, feeling sick to my stomach.

_To: Annabeth Chase_

_From: Noah Harrison_

_I heard you say the name a few days ago, and I was just thinking about it. So, I just looked it up. I wasn't going to tell you since I gave you such a hard time about listening in on me. Sorry…_

My stomach felt hollow as I realized that I had barely lied to Annabeth before now.

I glanced over at Annabeth, who was looking at me too. She pursed her lips and shrugged as if to tell me that, while she was still suspicious, it was fine. I wanted to smile from that, but I felt terrible.

Annabeth went back to work, and I thought about my life. I thought about how I had given up on her.

I couldn't remember why I had though. It almost felt like my past had been a dream, a dream I had sadly woken up with. Killing and spying became my reality, and I didn't know what Annabeth was.

_Annabeth:_

"Hey, you coming?" Noah smiled, standing in the glass doorway.

"Yeah, I just need to wrap something up, so I'll be a little late. Want me to pick up a pizza on my way home?" I smiled, acting like this morning hadn't happened.

"Sure. See you then, Annabeth," Noah continued to smile, and I watched him walk away and go into the elevator. I waved a weak wave towards him as the metal doors closed him in.

I immediately went down to my computer screen.

Noah was a lot of things.

He was nice. He was funny. His smile makes me stomach flip everytime I see it, and I love his laugh. He doesn't give in, and he doesn't do everything I want, which I strangely like. But he's also, and most importantly, _lying_…

I didn't like liars. I never had. No one does, I guess. Bu I got a literal phobia of it after Luke. At the time, I had thought Luke was just lying about something basically unimportant that I probably didn't want to know about, like having a girlfriend or something. I ignored his weird actions that seemed out of character, and I pretended everything was fine. Then he tried to kill my best friend with a poisonous scorpion and tried to take over the world and kill the gods.

So, lying and I just don't mix.

I am aware that it is Noah's job to lie. It's mine, too.

But there are some things you just don't lie about, and I have a feeling he didn't get the memo.

My fingers seemed to fly over the keyboard as I typed in Noah Harrison into the database.

_**Person Found:**_

_**Noah Goodwin Harrison**_

I clicked on the link and looked at the form that told me about him. Most was simple stuff, like his name or his job. He's an only child. He was in a boarding school, Yancy Academy in New York, until he graduated. I didn't see anything special, though, until I reached the next page button.

No records left. 2833

I went through the other ones and noticed that it stopped at age nineteen. The last thing was his 'past', the one that he told everyone instead of the real one. But, nineteen was this big cut off. There was absolutely nothing except for a few pictures of him at the end. Most were him as he is now, but there was one that was different. His eyes were blue and his hair was sandy blonde. He smiled into the camera, in an airport. The name at the bottom told me that this was the picture taken after his first mission and that Anna Holmes, who was his supervisor, had submitted it.

There was basically nothing about Noah that I could learn through here except for the one sign at the end that said that there were no records before nineteen.

Nineteen.

He joined at _eighteen_.

So, what happened in this year?

And who did he join as?

I logged off the database and tried to think about it.

My phone buzzed with a new text from Noah.

"What did you do?" I mumbled as I reached for the phone.

_Want to watch Clash of the Titans?_

_-Noah_

I waited for a moment, feeling something familiar.

_Yeah, just ordered the pizza. Be there in 30 :-) _

_**I know it's lame, but I wanted to get out there. I've just been so out of it. But I promise there will be more. Right now I just need to get back to my school work, which kind of sucks since I am so behind thanks to missing a few days before break :( **_


	6. Chapter 6

_**My friend Zane and I were reading the ultimate guide a few days ago, so I'm using some of those stuff. Oh, and he scored son of Poseidon and I got daughter of Athena. That made some things pretty awkward… Well, until we started fighting over a five year old toy…**_

_**Don't comment.**_

_**;-D**_

_**Percy:**_

I stared out the plane's window and felt a sudden pang of fear. I had flown thousands of times, always in Zeus Airline flights to make Zeus happy, and nothing had happened. But, with Annabeth with me, I feared even more. I didn't want anything to happen to her, and being on a plane with Annabeth was endangering her.

Annabeth didn't notice, of course. We were flying from North Carolina to LA, which was about a six hour flight. We woke up about five, and we boarded the company's plane at six. Annabeth quickly fell back asleep as soon the plane took off, and, two hours later, she was finally waking up.

She typed something up on her laptop, as she always seemed to be doing, and she was too engrossed in that to notice me. I took this time to finally get a good look at her. Usually, I had to force myself not to look at her so she wouldn't notice, but I finally was getting a chance.

Her blonde hair was pulled into a messy bun, and it was falling into her grey eyes. She bit her bottom lip from thinking, and a pair of reading glasses was perched on her thin nose. There was a splatter of monster blood on her jeans right under her knee. She had a small scar right above her left eye, and I caught a glimmer of what I think was a tattoo on her right shoulder.

Though different than she used to be, she still had that same essence to her. I didn't know if it was her soft beauty or her motherly approach to things, like how she always took up on chances to reprimand me.

I forced my eyes back to the clouds.

"Are you scared of flying?"

I turned back to see that Annabeth had put away her laptop and was staring at me.

"Uh, yeah. A little. My grandparents died in a plane crash," I nodded, leaving out who my father was on purpose.

"Were you close?" Annabeth set her reading glasses in the same bag with her laptop.

"No," I shook my head, "I never met them. It was way before I was born. What about you? Were you close, to _your_ grandparents I mean?"

"They basically raised me. My dad was young when I was born, and, by the time he was old enough to really raise me, I felt like I didn't belong in this new family he had then. So, I spent most of my time with them, especially my grandfather. He was an architect, always showing me the blueprints," Annabeth smiled like she was stuck in the memory, and I nodded, even though I already knew all that.

"So, do you draw or write?" Annabeth, finally slipping out of the trance, nodded towards the green notebook in my lap.

"Uh, not really. I just occasionally draw or something to get my mind off flying. Other than that though, I'm not nearly good enough for it to count it as a hobby," I smirked, and it gained a smile from Annabeth.

"I used to draw. I wanted to be an architect."

"Why aren't you?" I asked. I had been wondering why she was here instead of in that architectural firm that her half-brother, Malcolm, opened a year ago in LA.

Yes, I _googled_ him.

"My mom made it possible so that I could work on rebuilding Olympus. And, when things changed for me, architecture reminded me too much of the past. And… I guess I wanted something new."

"And this is definitely new," I smiled, and she met my gaze. Her smile grew, and my heart melted.

"What did you used to do? When you were a kid? What did you do to fill your time?"

_Thought of her._

"Swimming. I did a lot of swimming, and getting in trouble. A _whole lot_ of that."

She laughed a little bit, and I remembered how much I loved her laugh.

"I used to make sims videos," Annabeth blushed as she pushed a chunk of her blonde hair behind her ear, showing me a pair of owl earrings I had given her as a sixteenth birthday present.

"_Sims videos_?"

"When I was in boarding school, I had this roommate, River Cabella. She played sims, and she transferred all the expansion packs to my computer. She loved Youtube, and we'd take video of the sims. And I turned it into music videos to whatever song she picked," Annabeth smiled sheepishly, and I realized that she had never told me that before.

"Seriously?"

"Yeah," Annabeth blushed, "All of my friends at a school knew about it, and they thought it was kinda cool that River and I were that creative. But I never told any of my camp friends or anything."

"Why not?"

"I don't know. I wasn't that Annabeth to them. And, by the time I was close enough to my other friends to tell them, I went to a different school. And the sims video thing was basically over."

"Wow, are the videos still up?"

"I don't know. The girl I did it with, River, had the account. If she kept the videos up, they'd be like ten years old. Last I checked, which was nine years ago when I was talking about it with my college roommate, she had most of her account filled up with these weird stories. She wanted to be a director or something," Annabeth shrugged, and I nodded.

"Too bad. I'd love to see it."

"So you can make fun of me?" she asked, even though her eyes showed that she knew the answer.

"Probably," I smirked, and she smiled though she didn't want to.

"You know, one day I'm going to find some deep dark secret of yours," Annabeth smiled, and I bit my tongue not to spill.

"Good luck with that one."

_**Annabeth:**_

"I'm going to get some coffee. Want some?" I asked Noah as he continued to search through a duffle for his spare gun.

"Yeah, sure," he told me absently, like he didn't even know he was talking.

I picked up my cell phone from the hotel dresser and my key. This time, we weren't in the same room, which would help after still not knowing what happened last time we stayed in the same room. I was in the room next door, and the door that connected the two basically had never been closed.

We got here an hour ago, and Noah went looking for that extra gun as we went over the plan. Within about sixty seconds of him looking for it, he zoned out of our conversation, but it's not like it was an interesting conversation anyway.

I left the room without another word and pressed a number into my cell phone. It rang twice before I got a response.

"Hello?" Windal's voice sounded dull across the phone line.

I had known Windal since college. He was a self-made millionaire by the time he was nineteen, and he could do anything he wanted, which he did. Throughout college, his hair was a new color every month, and he had finally settled on a black afterwards. He still worked on computer programming, mainly just to fill the time. He was married once, to a friend of mine named Rebecca when they found out she was pregnant, but that only lasted a year before we found them in court for a divorce. Windal got most of the custody of Katarina, their daughter, after Rebecca moved to Brazil for her new husband's job, and it was hard to picture Windal as a father. Three years ago, when Katarina turned one, Windal took a job in the Agency working on a computer in his own home so he could take care of Katarina.

"Hey, Windal."

"Annabeth," I knew he was smiling, "I am _dying_ here."

"Why this time? Katarina gave you another pretty princess make-over?"

I smirked at the memory of the photos.

"I'm in the _PTA._ _Me_!"

"They let_ you_ in the _PTA_?"

"I know right? What the hell were they thinking?" Windal ranted, "Anyway, what's up?"

"You remember when I called you a few days ago?" I pressed the elevator button and glanced over my shoulder.

"Right, you wanted me to do some digging. I've been working on that," Windal told me, and I heard the muffled sound of a computer turning on.

"Get anything yet?" I almost begged.

"I looked through everything. Your boy here is a top-level cover-up, My Dear. I looked everywhere-"

I stepped into the elevator, hoping to get away from Noah as I talked about this.

I liked the guy, _a lot._ Maybe, dare I say, _romantically_. I don't know what it is about him, especially since I know he'll probably never tell me about who he really is and all. And that is my problem, especially since I'm a descend of Athena, which by definition means I don't _want_ to know things but can't stand _not_ to know them.

And Noah is like the ultimate puzzle. Sometimes, it was fun, like the playful banter that seemed to follow us everywhere we went. But, now that I was sort of…_falling for him_, I needed to know more other than "I was born, I was a kid," when I ask about his childhood. Most of the time, I could tell that he wanted to tell me, but he couldn't.

So I just had to figure it out.

"And I have nothing. Other than what you said earlier about him suddenly appearing at nineteen. There's no clue as to who he was, who he really is. All I know is that he was a blonde for a year while Noah Harrison, but I'm not saying he's really blonde either."

I groaned.

"Do you have _anything_, Windal?" I bit my lip, "For God's sake, I'm _living _with him, yet I know _nothing_ about him."

"Sort of. I took a picture of him now and sent it in to see what he would have looked like when he was younger. It'll take a while to get that in though," Windal answered.

"How would that help me, Windal?" I hit my head on the elevator wall, "He became Noah Harrison when I was nineteen. I didn't start working here until I was in my twenties."

"I was thinking that I could take that picture and reference it through the database. Maybe see who he joined as. And that could bring me somewhere," Windal tried, and the elevator door pinged open. I pushed a chuck of hair behind my ear and came through the lobby and towards the café at the right edge of the hotel.

"Why do you think about all this? I mean, you've seen _everything, _but it's a little _extreme_, right?" I asked as I scanned through the menu of different coffees nonchalantly.

Windal paused.

I didn't like when he paused. He only paused when things weren't too good. He paused when he explained that he was going to spend a year in LA instead of sticking around with me when he was my best friend. He paused when he told me about how he had gotten in a bar fight and needed me to bail him out from jail. He paused when he explained that he was marrying Rebecca because she was pregnant.

And he was pausing _now._

"I don't know, Annabeth. _But_ I do know that there is someone in particular who they don't want to know about who he really is," Windal told me, sympathy evident in his voice. I was about to respond when I heard a joyful squeal of a five year old.

"Annabeth, Kat just got home from school. I'll call you tomorrow," he hung up before I could say goodbye, and I slid my cell phone into my pocket.

_**Percy:**_

I watched as Annabeth slid the key into the hotel room's door. She did it without fear, like there _wasn't_ a chance that a guy who was known for killing people brutally with his bare hands would be inside. I didn't know if she was scared or not, but she had always been able to hide if she was. I remembered how much I had counted on it as a child. It was like the only constant in my life.

Following the green light that showed that the door was unlocked, Annabeth handed me the key that she had swiped from a maid's cart. I put it in my back-pocket to put it back on the maid's cart later and motioned for her to open the door.

There was no hesitation as she pushed it open and stepped inside. She slid into a pair of latex gloves, and I did the same as she flicked on the lights. I quietly closed the door behind me and stared into the room. It was a suite on the top floor, the kind that was more of a penthouse apartment than a hotel room.

"What are we looking for again?" Annabeth's grey eyes scanned the living room. In response, I handed her a photo of a macbook, with a stain of where a red sharpie bled on the laptop. Annabeth took in every detail about it before she finally folded it up and put it in her pocket.

"Are you sure he didn't take it with him?"

"Ninety percent sure," I shrugged, smiling a little.

Annabeth smiled slightly and looked back around the room.

"You take that bedroom. And I'll take the other," she pointed to each, and I nodded. She walked away without another word, and I found myself watching her for a moment.

It was weird how she seemed just the same as she did when we were teenagers, even though she looked different. Oh so very different she looked. But it was still the same in a way. Her intelligent eyes were still an electric grey, and her face was the same, other than her cheekbones becoming more pronounced and her lips became a little thicker. She was maybe two inches taller, but the same to me. Still beautiful.

I snapped myself out of it quickly and went on to the bedroom she had pointed to.

I was shocked to see a different atmosphere than the rest of the apartment. The other room, where Annabeth had disappeared to, had the door open, and it was the same sort of clean and modern room that seemed to be the theme of the apartment. But this little office was nowhere near that.

The small light in the corner was dim, and the light flicked because the bulb was dying. There was a small lamp on a desk that was providing most of the light, but it was still pretty dull. Papers, mostly paperwork or notebook paper, were scattered across the dark hardwood floors in such a way that it was almost impossible to see the expensive floors. There was a futon in the right back corner with blankets draped on it in piles. There was a black desk that took center-stage that seemed to have two desks connected on the two sides, with even _more_ papers spread on it.

I reached into the pack pocket of my jeans for a miniature flashlight. After flicking it on, I searched the floor for a path without papers, so that I wouldn't leave any trace of having had been here. I found only one that had been made, and it went straight to the desks. I slipped a spare lamp on the desk, and that made it easy enough to see.

"And there it is," I grinned as I pulled out the macbook.

"Annabeth-" I stopped as a picture fell out of the macbook, and I could have stopped breathing.

I pushed it into my bag and put it down on the ground, forgetting the rules I had made to never mess with a scene I was breaking into. I picked the photo up and stared at it.

"No," I fell to my knees and flipped over the photograph to see the details of the subject of the photo.

_**Name:**__ Perseus Jackson_

_**Age at Time of Photo:**__ Eighteen_

_**Height:**_ 6'3

_**Hair Color: **__Black_

_**Eye Color: **__Green_

_**Wanted For: **_

I gasped, excited to see why I was wanted, why I was forced into this life. No one had ever told me, and I sometimes thought they didn't even know.

I looked to see what it would say and I saw only "Wanted for" before something had smudged it in such a way that I couldn't read it.

I stood up and flipped the picture over. It was the day before the Agency took me. I was going for a jog in a park that was nearby my parent's apartment. I had stopped there to check my pulse and take a breath when the camera man had snapped the picture. I remembered the day perfectly, as I did with just about every day before the Agency, and I had been absolutely sure that I saw no one in the park with me.

To stop the pain, I put the photo into my pocket, but I couldn't snap myself out of the trance.

"What is it, Noah?"

I looked up to see Annabeth standing at the door way. She stared directly at me, as if she was almost worried.

"Uh," I snapped myself out of it, "I found the laptop. We better go."

Annabeth looked at me for a long moment, as if deciding if she could believe me or not. Finally, she smiled weakly and nodded.

I followed after her, making sure to turn off all of the lights and such, but I still thought about the photo in my pocket. I was wanted?_ Still_? After all of these years, they _still_ wanted me. And I still had not one clue as to why.

Annabeth glances at me another moment, and I instantly knew that she was on my tail.

Crap, can't I get a freakin break here?

"You okay?" I asked Annabeth, and she smiled.

"Thinking about the long ride home," Annabeth lied.

_**Sorry it took so long. My great Aunt died, who I didn't really know, but my mom was heartbroken. So, we had to drive six hours home to see the family. Then my mom had a meltdown after going to the same funeral home that her father went to when he died. When that was finally over, we went on a family cruise with my grandparents to celebrate my grandfather's retirement and my dad's birthday. Then I had to race home on Monday to go to cotillion on time. Oh, and I'm starting to make sims videos for some weird reason, and I'm kind of getting addicted to making them.**_

_**But no excuse. I know. But… Wait, **_**no**_**… **_


	7. Chapter 7

_**Annabeth:**_

I logged into my work computer and surfed through the files.

The macbook Percy found on our last assignment was sent straight to the labs. Every bit and piece of it had been examined, and it was locked away in a secure facility for safe-keeping. Yesterday, the files were put up on my security level access, and I quickly snapped them up. I went to a folder called lists and read it.

Henchman List

Safehouses

Wanted List

I pressed "Wanted List" and sent it to the printers on B-1 to be delivered to the house. For now, I had plans. And reading a wanted list would take up that valuable time.

I went to my chat box and pressed Noah's name.

**Annabeth: What are you doing?**

It took about five seconds to get a response.

**Noah: Pretending to work. Bored out of my mind. You?**

**Annabeth: Thinking of things to do…**

**Noah: We're not going to see This Means War for the **_**third time**_**, are we?**

I smiled to myself and laughed.

**Annabeth: No, I was thinking more of going to the beach. It's a great day for it really.**

**Noah: When I offered that last week, you said it was too cold.**

**Annabeth: But it isn't now, which is why we should really go today.**

**Noah:…..**

I groaned.

**Annabeth: Oh crap, you're going to make me beg, huh?**

**Noah: Maybe….**

I looked through the glass walls and saw Noah. He smiled and shrugged, as if to say it was just business. I wanted to be mad, I wanted to be _furious._ I wanted to hold it against him for months and months until he got down on his knees and reluctantly apologized. I swear to you I really did.

But I just smiled at him and went back to the computer screen.

**Annabeth: Alright, **_**fine. Pwetty, Pwetty, Pwetty please, **_**come with me to the beach *puppy dog pout***

I looked over to see Noah snicker.

**Noah: As long as you make up the excuse.**

_**XXXXX`**_

I looked at my toes as I sat on the beach recliner. With a new friend I had made, Crissie, had gotten a pedicure. My toes were painted a light red, which I now realized matched the bathing suit I had changed into.

I pulled my wet hair out of the ponytail and pushed it back into a sleeker one. I found myself using the reflection of my shiny beach bag to watch Noah.

It was four o clock, and we had just gotten out of the water. The North Carolina sun was already starting to set, and I was still trying to figure out if Apollo was running early today for a date or if my watch was wrong.

While I was still thinking about that, I heard Noah's voice.

"Hey, delivery for you. Just came in," he handed me an envelope with just the words "Annabeth Chase" printed on it.

The wanted list.

I had forgotten about it completely, even though I had been thinking about it for weeks now.

Noah had seemed jittery on that job, and Noah Harrison wasn't _ever_ jittery. Even though I had known him for a short time, I knew he was never nervous when it came to work. It was what he knew best, what was something that would always be true. And that was why I knew something was up.

I spent hours thinking about what made him suddenly nervous, and I figured it had to be the computer, something was on there he knew about.

"Thanks, Noah," I took the envelope.

"So, what's in there?"

"Boring work stuff, going through some off the files of that computer we snagged. You know," I shrugged like it was nothing, and he watched me for a moment or two.

"Yeah," Noah sat down and reached for his kindle.

_**Percy:**_

"Good night, Noah," Annabeth yawned as she went up the stairs. I nodded and pretended to be more interested in the computer report I was reading.

I breathed a sigh of relief when the bedroom door closed behind her, and I instantly went to the opened file on the coffee table. She had read most of it on the beach and slid it back into the envelope when it came time to come back inside. She had set it down on the coffee table after getting a shell stuck in her foot and forgot about it, to my luck.

She had been trying to piece everything together for days, and I couldn't take much more of it. I had been trying to cover all of my secrets, but I didn't know which one she was near uncovering. I even had to buy special contacts that I could sleep in so she wouldn't see that my eyes were really green. I now had to have a stash of brown hair dye hidden under my bed so she won't see my hair turning black again.

And the moment I started hiding things in safes_ in _hidden safes, I knew I had to something about this.

I carefully pulled out the papers and turned to the page marked with a post-it that Annabeth had stopped at.

I went through pages and pages, seeing Agents I knew and bad guys I had come across before. And then finally, I got to the last page.

"And here we go."

As I had guessed, there was a picture with the name Percy Jackson at the bottom. It said everything the picture I had found said, and I was disappointed to see that it too didn't have the reason I was wanted. I looked around the room. I had powered off the house cameras, but I wanted to be sure that Annabeth hadn't planted anymore.

I slowly and carefully ripped out the paper, making so that you'd never know it had ever been there.

I mentally started writing my email to Anna about how we needed to cover this up when I went outside to the outdoor fireplace.

I started the fire slowly and threw the photo in. I watched it crumple up as it burned and the ashes started to fly up into the air.

"Good bye Percy Jackson."

_**XXXXX**_

I went to my closet.

"I knew I should have done laundry yesterday," I mumbled as I looked through the clothes in my closet. I could find pants and everything else in abundance but no shirts.

I had taken a shower to get the smell of smoke off me, and I had spent almost half an hour cleaning up to make it unnoticeable that I had burned the photo. I had even taken the time to write an email to Anna about who was in those files.

I reached up on the top shelf of my closet and picked up an ugly old tee shirt, sending pictures falling all across the door.

I groaned as I knelt to the ground to pick them up.

I felt sick as I looked at the pictures.

The first was my mom holding me as a little infant. There were a few more with me as a little kid, showing how I lost my first tooth and all that. Then I got to the really painful ones, Camp Half-Blood pictures. The one that hurt the absolute most was a picture from when I was sixteen.

Annabeth's long blonde hair had been braided by Juniper after losing a dare. Grover was wearing a "New York City" baseball cap and jeans, which I'm pretty sure was like his uniform for every day. I had my arm around Annabeth, and she smiled brightly in between us.

Unlocking the safe, I shoved the pictures inside.

If not for Annabeth finding them, it was so _I _couldn't find them.

_**Annabeth:**_

I reached for a tissue as I read the new text from Noah.

**Feel better, Annabeth. I don't think I can handle how boring work is without you for much longer :D**

I smiled as I wrote back.

**Thanks, Noah. Do you know where any cough syrup is?**

It took only a few more moments before I got a response.

**In my room, should be in the medicine cabinet. Not sure though. Might be out.**

I thanked him as I got off the couch and pressed pause on the Chick Flick. I went up the stairs slowly and I hesitated before finally going into his room.

I had gone in his room a lot, usually snooping, and it felt really weird to go in without having to hack into the security system.

Finally, I pushed the door open and was surprised by how clean it was. Noah was known for being messy, and I sometimes thought he had a secret room he really lived in instead of here. He kept things clean at home, even when he was cooking. If it's official, he keeps everything spotless, but, if not, it's a huge mess.

I walked through the room and straight towards the bathroom. I carefully opened it and found myself looking through the names.

Eye drops. Tylenol. Four bottles of nectar and five squares of Ambrosia. Nyquil PM. Motrin (Why the hell does he have motrin?). And Cough Medicine.

I reached for it and made a pack of daily contacts fall to the countertop.

I picked it up and found myself reading the post-it on the back.

_These should fit you perfectly, Noah. Too bad. I miss your green eyes._

_-Anna_

Green eyes.

He has green eyes.

He has _green eyes?_

I put the contact box up in the cabinet and closed it quietly. I brought out my cell phone as I carefully left the room, worried for cameras out of habit.

"Hey, Annie. What's up?" Windal answered on the third ring.

"Any news on Noah?" I asked hopefully.

"Nothing, sorry, Annabeth."

"Well, um, I found out his eyes are green, if that helps," I told him.

"Are you okay, you seem like you're about to cry, Annabeth."

I considered lying to him, I considered lying to my best friend. I was about to cry honestly, and it had nothing to do with my burning throat from the cold and it had everything to do with Noah. During the short time I had lived here, I had grown fond of him. Then I grew attached to him, not wanting to be away from him. And then I started to love his quirks that had first bothered me, like how he talks to himself or how he never tells me anything about himself or how he could be a complete idiot sometimes.

I become close to Noah, maybe even closer than I was to Windal. Noah and I understood things that others just didn't seem to understand, and, if I ever wanted blue Oreos, he was the guy to go to. I trusted him, even though he didn't trust me enough to tell him about his life.

"I think I might like him, Windal," I finally answered.

"Well, I know you like him. You said you were pretty good friends."

"No, Windal, not that kind of like. The other kind. The annoying kind. The kind that got you a_ daughter_."

"Are you telling me that _Annabeth Chase_ has a _crush?_ The same Annabeth Chase that thought hearts are supposed to beat not to think?"

Ever since Percy had gone missing, I had dislocated myself from my heart. I had taken my mother's advice and learned how to use only my brain to think. During college, the fraternities had a war on which one could get me to fall in love first. And they all ended up losing and having to jump into a freezing cold lake, completely naked.

"I know, I know."

"And to guy who you know nothing about. And you _hate_ not knowing _everything_. You must be in hell right now," Windal continued.

"Yeah, I get it. Thanks for rubbing it in. Completely necessary."

"No problem, happy to do my duty. But this is pretty serious. I have to dig deeper, I can't let my Annabeth go in this thing blind.

"Thanks, Windal."

"Just concentrate on getting better and try not to work. You need rest."

_**XXXXX**_

I tried not to work, I promise you I really did. But, three chick flicks and ordering a pizza later, I found myself staring at my laptop as it beckoned me towards it. Eventually, I reached for it and logged in.

First, I read through my emails. There was one from Anna, informing me on a mission I might be interested in.

After that, I checked my calendar for the week and found that an operative from California was flying in next week to talk about the man we had stolen from last time.

I rechecked the watch list and found the same old people on there.

I even checked in on Grover and Juniper to see that Grover was working and Juniper was taking care of the toddlers, who also had a cold.

And then I pulled up the files from the computer we had stolen on our last mission.

They were the same as before, annoyingly so. I used a search engine on the Henchman list, seeing if they were already locked up and found that five of them were. I checked through the safehouse list and saw that the agency had people already watching it and that none were near to me, which kinda sucked. I kept going, file after file until I reached the 'Wanted List' again.

I had read it before, but I decided to go back through it.

And then I noticed something I hadn't seen before.

It said I was on page one of seventy.

But the booklet I had only had _sixty-nine_ pages.

I scrolled down to the last page and gasped.

There was a picture of a boy, about eighteen. He was in a park, taking a breathe and pulling earphones out of his ears. His black hair was shaggy and falling into his eyes in an adorable way, the way that Percy used to.

I read through the name and felt my heart stop.

_Perseus "Percy" Jackson._

I stared at the computer screen, my heart eating like I was running a marathon. I was trying to tell if I was dreaming or if this was really happening, and I wasn't sure which one I wanted it to be. My eyes quickly ran over the description.

It stated his age at the time of the photo, eighteen. It told me his height, eye color, and hair color, which were all things I already knew. The reason he was wanted was blank, stating it had been lost during the transfer to electronics.

He was wanted dead or alive, whichever as long as they got their man.

I had heard it a lot of times, usually with Henchman who had gone rogue, either starting their own evil operation or going good. If they were captured alive, they were slowly tortured until they wished they had been killed first and were eventually killed after the need to keep living had long left.

Either way, Percy was dead.

Then the page disappeared, gone from the file and it took me right back to the page before, about an elderly man named Jenkins.

It was just gone, like it had never existed.

But I knew it _did_.

_**Poor little old Noah *Cough, Cough, Percy, Cough* Just can't get a break, huh? **_

_**We should send him a muffin basket.**_

_**Anyway, enough drama for you?**_

_**It fits my need to keep this thing going to how she finds out who he is, which I promise you'll love. And it fits your need for drama. Good deal, right? I thought so, too.**_

_**Oh and I am looking for a beta for my story,**_Once An Alpha, Always an Alpha**, _which shows off my Clique heritage. You don't have to know anything about Clique, don't worry. I just need someone who can help me with grammar and keep me on track. I'm going to warn you, I can be pretty annoying because I'm always forgetting and always busy. But I've been told repeatedly I need a beta for that story, and I'm starting to think the same thing._**

_**Anyway, I'm about to technically become a published author!**_

_**No, my book has not been published yet, considering that would require finally stopping how I continuously edit it. But my short story for school won my class and was sent in to be graded for the entire grade, and they got such great stories that they put them together and are going to sell them. As my mom annoyingly brags to my friends, it counts as being a published author.**_

_**So, happy dance!**_

_**I should send me a muffin basket…**_


	8. Chapter 8

_**Annabeth:**_

I sat in the basement study that I had claimed as my own and glanced at the clock on my desk, hoping it would still be nine like it had been the last time I looked at the clock.

12:09

"Well there's still a nine in there."

I sighed, knowing I needed to get to bed for work tomorrow. I couldn't keep making Noah do all the work, even though we barely did _any_ work, but I couldn't seem to function without sleep.

How long had it been since I had slept?

One?

Two?

_Three_ nights?

I didn't know. I only knew the reason why I didn't sleep, and that was five letters.

_P.E.R.C.Y._

I had backed off learning about Noah and had dedicated all of my time to finding out where the hell Percy Jackson was. Even my job, which never _ever_ came last before now, was suffering because of how tired I was.

I knew I should stop. It would be a miracle, an act of God really, if he was still alive. Considering how well he got along with the gods, that was even more unlikely. And, with the small percentage that he would be alive, it would be completely impossible for me to ever get him back. I had known that for a decade now, so why couldn't I get it through my thick head yet?

It seemed obvious to everyone but _me_ that I should of logged off and gotten my first night with more than an hour of sleep.

But I was too stubborn.

After pulling my hair into a ponytail, I went to my last resort when I needed something. I looked on…_Google._

Yes, google. I had spy resources that could tell me right now if the President was sneezing and what brand of tissue he wiped his nose with. I can even check a paternity test at any hospital and find out which guy was the father, something that was helpful when my dear friend Rebecca worried if Windal was the father. But I was using a search engine that could track everything I look up.

Now I'm getting desperate.

I rested my chin in my hand and yawned as I continued to read. As it happens, there were about two thousand options, not including articles in the paper about Percy when he kept getting in trouble on our quests. There were a millions of those. Some missing sites of "If you see this person, call" things. And then there was just random junk.

"Knock-Knock," it was a whisper, but it was quiet enough in here to hear in a pin drop. Before I could answer, the door opened, showing a persistent Noah. I straightened my spine and looked across at him.

"You're still awake," he closed the door behind him and came to sit in a chair in front of me.

"What were you planning to do if I was asleep?" I laughed, and he shook his head.

"Pervert."

"It came to your mind, Noah."

He laughed for a minute before gesturing to the apple he had come in with, and I shook my head. With that, he bit right in, something I hadn't done since I was seventeen and my little sister lost her tooth in an apple. He filled the annoying silence by eating.

"So, Perverted One, why are you still awake? Wasn't that part of your lecture that you gave me yesterday? We don't have a life, so we might well get some sleep," I asked.

"Couldn't sleep, and I really wanted an apple," he looked at the half-finished apple.

"And congrats to getting that apple."

"What about you, Wise One?" he took another bite of the apple, "Why are you still awake?"

I hesitated.

"Uh, just… working on something."

He raised his eyebrows.

"Is Annabeth keeping a secret from me? Little Miss Talk-So-Much?" Noah laughed.

I blushed and threw a crumpled piece of paper at him, and he just smiled.

"And you don't keep secrets from me, Noah?"

He smiled with hesitation to speak.

"Touché," he threw away the apple and came to stand behind me.

"You're sure you want to talk about it?" Noah started to massage my neck, and it took all of my will power not to moan. I suddenly became tired, and I wanted to go to sleep for the next ten years.

"Let's see what you were looking at."

I was enjoying the massage too much to stop Noah from looking at the computer, and I didn't really care too much. It wasn't like it would make a difference or anything. It's not like this was the big secret I could never tell anyone.

The fact that I was studying _Noah_ was the secret.

"Percy Jackson."

His hands around my neck when slack, and he didn't speak for a long time.

"You knew, didn't you?" I moved his hands off my neck, which happened to be slowly but surely tightening around my shoulder blades, and swirled around in the chair, but he seemed mesmerized by the computer screen.

I had never seen Noah so immersed. It was like an Aphrodite girl staring at a photo of some teen idol, almost as if they knew and were dating them. I knew then that Noah I known him in some way. Maybe it was a report he read, or maybe he actually met my former best friend/boyfriend. But Noah knew Percy. I knew that much.

"Knew what?" he didn't take his eyes off of the computer screen.

"About him being in a Wanted List?"

I waited, hoping he would tell me the truth about having known about him in some way.

Noah's eyes met mine.

"What?"

I hadn't seen shock so pure as the time Chiron found my birth-control pills back when I was sixteen, which I actually was taking to have less "Time of the Months" instead of what he thought.

"That computer we found. I looked at the online version of the files, and the last page had his name. And then something weird happened…" I shook my head, not sure how I should tell him. The only person I knew of who could take out Percy from the list was Anna, and Anna was like his mother. It's not like I could just accuse Anna of trying to cover something important up.

"What do you mean _weird_?"

I hesitated, not sure how to put it.

"It was… _gone_."

He stared at me for a long moment.

"_Gone_?"

"Just _gone_. I was reading the paper, and it just disappeared, went back to page before. Someone deleted it," I shook my head, still trying to figure it out myself.

"Annabeth, are you _sure _you saw it?" Noah asked, sounding like he hoped I would say no.

It was a pretty good question, something I wondered myself. In reality, I wanted it to have been an overdose-of-cough-syrup induced dream. I wanted to forget about Percy Jackson, and how much I missed him. I wanted to become normal, or as normal as I could be in my profession.

I didn't want my old life to come back up. From the moment Percy went missing, that life was over. I spent months trying to find him, missing a lot of things in my life. I begged the gods to tell me where he was, and they didn't comment until Athena told me that he was gone. She didn't say anything else, but it was clear that moment was supposed to be an ending point for me. Something classified was going on, and I could never know about it.

When high school was over, I went to college and moved in with some of my siblings afterwards. I worked at a job I liked but didn't love. I had sisters who were always trying to set me up with guys, but it never worked. By the time I reached the Agency, I was ready for a new beginning. I was ready to put that past behind me and forget about people like Luke, Silena, and especially Percy Jackson.

And I did, or I forgot enough to tell myself that I had completely gotten rid of that time.

But that list, that Percy Jackson, was back. And I didn't want to have to go back to the painful memories of how much love I had lost.

But I knew what I saw.

"One hundred percent."

_**Percy:**_

I nervously strummed my fingers on the metal elevator walls.

This was a continuous game of wits, and, so far, I was losing to Annabeth.

First, I hide the original, then I carefully rip out the photo of Percy Jackson from her wanted list. I send an email to Anna to take down the photo, and she does around noon.

Then Annabeth goes on the online files and sees the entry about him five minutes before Anna takes it down.

What kind of cruel twist is this?

I get Annabeth off Noah's back and onto the bigger secret, Percy Jackson.

My secrets, or at least the big one, had been carefully tucked away where Annabeth would never find them. Everything was out of her reach, and it was better that way. But there were traces of Percy Jackson everywhere. Like my first year living with Anna back in Chicago. I kept my looks the same and went by Peter Johnson, which isn't too far of a stretch for Annabeth to figure out.

At the end of my first year of training, my name officially changed to Noah Harrison, but there was no history of me before I was nineteen. There were a few records we had placed at Yancy Academy, but they were easy to see through. I had no medical records until I was about twenty, even though I had accidentally told Annabeth that I had been taking medicine for my ADHD since I was about ten.

The trail went back farther and farther until Annabeth could finally piece together the all important solution.

_Noah Harrison is Percy Jackson._

The elevator door dinged open, and I went to the glass door of Anna's office.

I knocked on the glass, and Anna looked up from her tablet. Anna smiled and waved me in, and I pushed it open, thinking of what I would say to her.

"Hey, Noah. What's up?" she smiled as she motioned for me to sit down, and I waited until the door was safely closed behind me for my panic attack to begin.

"I think I need to take some time off," I sighed as I collapsed on one of the chairs.

"_You_? Time off?" Anna laughed, "What happened?"

"Annabeth."

"What? Is she pregnant or something?"

I crossed my arms and stared at her.

"That's basically the only thing that could get you to take time off, Noah," Anna shrugged.

"Agreed, I'd have to go track down and kill the father," I nodded, seeing her point.

"Not exactly what I mean since you two are clearly still head-over-heels for each other, but I'd prefer not to start something here. So, why, dear Noah, are you taking time off?"

"Because my nerves are shot, and I'm going to wind up in a mental institution if I don't leave," I buried my face in my hands.

"What happened this time, Percy?" she laughed, lowering her voice as she defiantly called me by my real name.

"That. _Percy_ happened."

"Percy happened?" Anna looked at me quizzically.

"Yes, Percy happened. You remember those files from the Macbook? She found the page on Percy just a few minutes before it was deleted. Now, she is using her Athena Determination to find Percy Jackson," I shook my head and looked around the room, hoping Anna still had that secret bottle of vodka hidden in here.

"That's kind of sweet actually," Anna smiled, and I stared at her.

"Do you have any idea what she would do to me if she found out who I was? She'd take that dagger I gave her for her seventeenth birthday, and yes she would search for _that dagger_, and she would slowly kill me until a point where living was worse than death."

"That's a little melodramatic, Noah," Anna shook her head.

"Actually, I was being kind to Annabeth. She'll do much, _much_ worse."

Anna simply shrugged with a playful smile, as if she was enjoying my sorrow.

"Whether she forgives you and there is a wedding, or she kills you and there is a funeral, I will be sure to attend," she smiled wide.

And I just stared at her.

"Here, Noah," Anna finally filled the silence by reaching into her desk and bringing out a folder. I hesitated but took it when she set it on the end of the table for me.

"What is this?"

"A mission. It'll distract Annabeth and calm you. If you take it, you can leave in two days," she shrugged again, and I smiled.

"Thanks."

"Good luck with trying to hide Percy Jackson from Annabeth. She'll find out one way or another. And don't you want to be the one to tell her?"

I hesitated, hating when Anna went all "Lifetime-Life-Lesson" on me.

"Thanks, Anna. I have to get back to work."

_**Annabeth:**_

I pulled my wet hair into a ponytail, or what kind of a ponytail I could make with my short hair, and I let in the thoughts about what I should do with my hair like growing it out or maybe getting bangs.

I hadn't thought of thing like my hair or things like that in a long time, maybe years really. Usually, I thought it was silly, something for Aphrodite girls to spend their time wondering about. But it was a nice change from work and Percy, and Noah for that matter.

I needed to think of things like my hair and seeing which make-up really helped my tired face and which was just making it worse.

Tonight, I planned on getting my first night of sleep, _real_ sleep. I even planned on watching Vampires Suck with Noah, because I knew that I wouldn't work around him. Otherwise, I might end up starting on something and not ending it until dawn.

Without meaning to, I gave myself a once-over to see if I looked good enough not to cringe if Noah saw me. But I quickly reminded myself that he had seen me sick as a dog last week, and I gave up the once-over before I could reach a conclusion.

I went down the steps two at a time, hoping to have the DVD menu on before Noah got back with the pizza. I loved to tease him about him being late, and he hated it.

So of course I wanted to do it.

I was sitting through the second commercial when the door swung open.

"Sorry, the pizza took forever to get. I see I'm not too late though," Noah motioned towards the TV as he set the pizza box down on the coffee table in front of me.

"Yup," I concealed my sigh and watched as he opened the pizza box.

"Anna gave me a mission today," he told me nonchalantly as he went back to the kitchen to get plates.

"Really?" I got up to help him, and to get a drink.

"Wanna go? It could get your mind of that guy, Percy. I think you need to relax for a while. And we can leave the day after tomorrow, if you want," Percy didn't look at me. Instead, he continued to put pizza on places.

I stopped to think about it.

He was right, about the relaxing part at least. Even if he was completely off-base about the Percy thing, Noah had a point. I knew he didn't want me to keep working on the Percy case, but I didn't know why. I hoped that Noah just didn't like to see me so worried and upset, but I didn't dare flatter myself like that. In our line of work, it was known that usually there was some secret advantage for them, and I didn't want to be an idiot.

I _hated_ being oblivious when it came to anything, especially that.

I stared at him for a moment or two.

He was handsome, sort of in a suffer boy way. I wished I could have seen his green eyes though. I doubted his would be as beautiful as Percy's, who I could tell anywhere, but I still wanted to see them. And I wondered what color his hair really was.

In any case, even if he had been born with red eyes and purple hair, he would have been handsome.

"Sure," I finally answered as I brought a coke out of the frig.

"You'll go?" he turned around, sort of shocked that I wanted to go with him.

"Do you not want me to go or something?" I laughed, worrying that he actually was.

"No, no," Noah shook his head, "I just kind of worried that you'd choose to stay here and would have a nervous breakdown in the next few days."

I smiled to myself, mainly because I knew he was actually right about what would happen if I stayed home and kept on working.

"I need to get back out there. This solitude it driving me insane, and maybe I'll find a lead."

"Right, um, _a lead_," Noah seemed to clam up, "Completely possible."

He acted like that was a bad thing.

"Coke?" I held up the drink.

"Do we have any more of that blue soda?"


	9. Chapter 9

_**Percy:**_

_I brushed Annabeth's hair out of her grey eyes as she snuggled closer to me. She was basically sitting _on_ me than sitting _beside_ me. It was a beautiful starry night, and I had met Annabeth out on hills to watch the sky._

_We said out loud that this was just to spend some time together, but it was really about not wanting to have to be apart, especially not now. Not when sleeping only left us with bad nightmares, which made us scream. Neither of us could quite sneak into where we were staying._

_I was to stay in the Roman Camp. Jason had the private house. And my roommates would notice if Annabeth suddenly showed up._

_It's not how other people would see it, us sleeping in the same room or something. I just want to be there, hold her as she wakes up crying._

"_So, how has it been? These last six months, I mean," I asked as I tightened my grip around the blonde._

"_Hell."_

_I laughed and kissed the top of her head._

"_How about you, Perce?" Annabeth asked._

"_I don't remember it. I was asleep, remember? _Luckily_," I smiled, and Annabeth leaned into me._

"_Looks like I win, huh?"_

_I laughed again and nodded._

"_My Wise Girl wins yet again."_

_Annabeth paused._

"My Wise Girl_," Annabeth rested her head on my chest, talking mainly toherself._

"_Yes, my _Wise Girl_, forever," I kissed the top of her head, "You're not getting rid of me that easily."_

"_Good," Annabeth told me, her voice sounding like she could cry at any minute, "Because you'll _always_ be my Seaweed Brain."_

"_I promise I'll always be there," I told her as brushed her hair some more._

"_You promise?" Annabeth looked up at me._

"_I promise," I leaned down to Annabeth to kiss her._

As I sat there, watching Annabeth follow the GPS directions, I realized that I had broken my promise.

Before now, I had forgotten that promise. I had forgotten Annabeth, or at least I had forgotten that she was indeed my Annabeth, instead of just something I read in a book or something.

The Agency had seen a lot in the ten years it had been open.

It had seen betrayal, death, and greatness too.

But I was a first.

They had never had anyone as powerful or as secretive as me. They had never had to work so hard to keep a secret, and that was saying something. Thanks to that, my secrets became the Agency's secrets.

As Agents, we pledge ourselves to protect the Agency's secrets.

I loved my job, I loved every damn minute of it. It was everything I had hoped for as a job, and I had put everything into it. I didn't have a _life_ because my job came first.

But, as I sat in the car, I realized that I was at the Crossroads.

It was something all Agents knew about, and it was something I hated. When Villains came to this, it was unpredictable. Some of them were pure evil and kept it up, and some left it all to go down the right path.

The Crossroads told who you really were, the person you are underneath.

_The Crossroads_ is a nickname that my fellow Agents had given had given to a life changing moment where you have to make a big decision. In our line of work, it was pretty much the same.

The Agency or the one's you love.

Agents before me had warned me of the trouble of Crossroads. I even had Anna as proof of their existence after seeing her give up her career to get married and have a child. But I never thought it would happen to me.

I had ignored the warnings of my follow Agents. I had blown them off, telling myself that it couldn't happen to me.

They all shared a common weakness.

They had a life, they had someone to love. They had these reasons that could keep them from really doing their job.

I decided at an early age that I would distance myself from these things so that I would never have to come to the Crossroads, that I would forever be this perfect Agent. I kept a distance from everyone else, and I never fell in love, mostly because I was already in love with a girl I would never see again.

But, here I sat.

I didn't know what to do, which promise was more important.

The promise I made to the Agency or the promise I made to Annabeth.

"You okay, Noah?"

I looked over at Annabeth, shocked by her suddenly talking after driving in silence for over an hour now.

"Hmm?"

"You're quieter than usual," Annabeth told me as she took a turn.

"I thought you said it was impossible for me to be quitter than usual," I smiled.

"Which is exactly why I'm trying to figure out what's wrong, O Silent One."

I smiled to myself, and I felt an overwhelming urge to tell her _the truth_.

This had happened a lot to me, wanting to tell her the truth. To tell her about having been kidnaped to join the Agency. About trying to find her but deciding she was safer where she was. About staying in the Agency and becoming the best. About why I didn't tell her why I decided against telling her who I really was.

But I ignored it.

"I'm just thinking."

"Thinking about?" Annabeth quickly looked away from the road to smile at me.

I hesitated.

"Secrets."

"Secrets," Annabeth played along, "_Noah Harrison_ has secrets? I'm so shocked!"

"Shut up, Annabeth."

Annabeth smiled but hesitated.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

_Yes, you have no idea how much._

"I don't think so."

"Noah, we're the only ones who we can really tell secrets to. We're the only ones who could understand. If you need to say anything, tell it to me. I'd tell you anything," she smiled comfortingly, and I let that sink it.

_**Annabeth,**_

I pushed the covers off of me, and I stared at the ceiling.

I got up and wriggled out of my loose tee shirt and into a camisole, but it didn't help how hot it was in the hotel room.

I had given Noah the bed because the bedroom of the suite was too cold, but I would happily switch now.

I grabbed a blanket and hesitated before knocking on the door. Noah managed out something weak that was a faint whisper which I could barely hear, so I pushed the door open.

Noah ruffled his hair as he sat up.

"Can't sleep either, eh?"

I shook my head.

"Too hot."

"Need to switch places?" Noah asked, and I shook my head yet again.

"You can stay, I gave you the room. I just wanted to see if I could get the AC to work out there," I went to the AC controller and tried to get it to work, but I could hear Noah laugh a little.

"Just sleep in here. We can figure it out tomorrow."

I turned back to look at Noah, a little hesitant to do so.

"I can sleep in the other room if you want," he laughed even more and raised his hands in surrender.

_**XXXXXX**_

Noah brushed my hair out of my eyes, and we continued to talk. It was edging on dawn, but we had given up on sleep so long ago. When I had come in here, I had tried to sleep for a long time and didn't speak. Then I gave up and started talking. When I started shivering, Noah wrapped his arms around me. And it had stayed like that since.

I didn't want to move, I didn't want him to let go. I wanted to stay there more than anything, to live in this moment forever.

I hadn't been like this, just talking or having anything that could border romantic since Percy had gone missing. It felt nice, even if he was just my friend and all. And I wanted to savor it, which is exactly why I had stayed up instead of how I had gotten sleepy an hour back.

"So, you've never really had a life, huh?" I asked as I heard the last of one of Noah's stories about his life, or the life he'd tell me about.

"I guess it comes with the job. You were lucky to have those few years to savor life," Noah told me.

"They weren't exactly worth savoring. I didn't have a life then either."

"Percy?" he asked, though he knew the answer.

"Yeah," I nodded, stirring the comfortable position we had been in.

"What was he like?" he asked, knowing I wanted to talk about it. He may not want to talk about his scars, but I was dying to set mine free. And I wanted to honor the memories of Percy, those happy moments that were really worth savoring.

"He was… a complete _Seaweed Brain_," I laughed, "I loved him to pieces though. He knew me so well. We were best friends, and I loved him more than anything. We could scream at each other one minute and not be able to be separated the next."

"You miss him a lot, don't you?" Noah sounded like it hurt him, too, and I couldn't figure out why.

"Yeah," I snuggled closer to Noah, "I do."

A silence filled the air.

"What would you do if you found him? If he was alive, I mean?"

I paused.

If you had asked me a few months ago, I would have answered easily, but it was hard now because of these feelings I have for Noah.

"What if he was nearby? In plain sight?"

"And he knew who I was? Where I was? And didn't tell me?"

"Exactly."

"I know what'd I do."

"What, Annabeth?"

"I wouldn't be able to take it. There's no betrayal like that. He wouldn't of been _my Percy_ to just watch me suffer and miss him so."

Noah seemed to think this over.

"Why do you ask?"

_**So, looks like Percy was about to tell her…**_

_**But chickened out.**_

_**Tsk, tsk, tsk.**_

_**Bad, Percy!**_

_**He's almost as bad as me for not updating!**_

**Almost.**


	10. Chapter 10

_**Percy:**_

"Close your eyes," Annabeth instructed, and I was fast to do so.

"Is this going to hurt?"

Annabeth didn't answer, which was an answer in its self.

I felt a cold wipe touch my skin, which made me hiss as the peroxide met my wound. Annabeth's hand became gentler as she blotted the blood on my leg, and I could tell that she hated the fact that was in pain.

I wasn't sure why that made me smile, but it did.

Maybe it was the fact that she still cared about me.

I had never _stopped_ loving Annabeth Chase, but, in the last week, it felt like I had fallen in love with her all over again. And, even better, I think Annabeth had fallen in love with me. Not Noah. She may be attracted to Noah, but I had let Perseus bleed through the facade of Noah Harrison. And she had fallen in love with him.

She hadn't told me or anything, but I knew Annabeth.

She had fallen in love with me once, and I had learned to know when she loved someone. And, in the last week, everything had pointed that way. From coming into my room and sleeping there, claiming she was having nightmares, to simply fixing my tie every morning before we went to work. I just knew.

I let out another hiss of pain, and Annabeth blotted it with a tissue.

"That all of the puss, Noah. It's just blood now," Annabeth smiled up at me, proud for me, and she reached for a gauze.

She started where my calf met my knee, and she wrapped it down to about an inch below the wound.

"Are you going to tell me how you got it yet?" Annabeth asked as she cut the gauze and used the special tape to hold it in place.

I hesitated.

Annabeth had been confined to finishing out our paperwork when Anna had given me an urgent call. I wasn't supposed to tell Annabeth, nor did I want to. I just told her the word _Work_, and she immediately understood what I had meant.

So, I went to where my rental SUV was waiting for me, and I did the old missions that I missed.

Simple. No great security systems. No blue-collar criminals. No rules that I had to abide by if I wanted to really catch the guy.

With these missions, I was free. I was off the books. No one knew me, which meant that no one cared. I didn't have to hesitate with my gun. And I did what I had to do.

I was once again a free agent.

That was what the Agency really was.

This high-up stuff was really a retirement for me, as a thanks for all the good I did. And I had to admit that I kind of liked not being on a hit list. I liked not having to arm myself all the time. I liked not having to be a lone wolf. And I loved not having to move a different apartment almost every three months.

But sometimes, it was fun to get back to my roots.

And, as part of these roots, I didn't speak.

I was supposed to be like it had never happened, I was supposed to even tell myself that it never happened.

But I couldn't help it.

I wanted to tell Annabeth the truth. For more than just how I got this cut. I wanted to tell her the entire truth.

"He got me pretty good," I smiled weakly at the gauze wrapped tightly around my leg, "But I got him worse."

Annabeth nodded, knowing what I meant by that.

"That's the only thing I don't miss about the _front lines_."

That was a saying that Agents before us had started generations ago.

"Yeah," I nodded, trying to block out all of the people's lives who had been taken by me.

The list was so long, until a point where I felt like I was drowning in it.

"You okay?" Annabeth asked as she stood up, leaving me to roll down the pant leg that she had pulled up when she noticed the awful cut.

"Do you think it's all worth it? The Agency? Giving up your life to become an agent?"

Annabeth hesitated.

"If you had a life ahead of you, no. But, if like me, you didn't, I'd say it was fine."

It was her place to judge, but she had never gotten the chance. Neither of us had made the choice to bring me to the Agency, changing our lives forever. But I had made the choice not to go home.

Not to tell Annabeth.

And I realized I had to tell her.

Tonight.

I had to tell her _tonight._

_**Annabeth:**_

I smiled as I pulled my hair into what ponytail I could manage and watched Noah make his move in Parcheesi.

Tonight had been an event for Zeus Airlines.

I had spent about a thousand dollars on a grey dress, and, though I was wearing probably the least expensive dress there, I had looked the best. And I had skipped my straightening session to leave my hair in its curls.

Overall, I had spent about three hours getting ready for the event.

And Noah and I had spent less than half of that at the party.

After a few Champaign flutes and constant sucking up, Noah and I had both simultaneously whispered the code word to each other that told each other that we both couldn't take much more. We had taken up on the first excuse we could think of, and we rang for the valet to bring Noah's BMW around to take us home.

When we had gone home, I had shimmied out of my dress and into my pajamas. I had quickly wiped off some of my make-up, but I hadn't taken too much time with it. Instead, I had ran down the stairs and ordered Chinese food and got out board games..

The Chinese food was long gone, but the game just never seemed to end.

I'd win, then Percy would demand a rematch.

He'd win, and I'd make him play again.

No one could win.

The winner was subjected to another round anyway, so it was like they were both losers.

I didn't care though.

I was having fun.

And fun was something I had missed for so long.

"And I win!" Noah smiled, "That's twenty. We said no more than twenty games!"

"Finally!"

Noah stood up and pulled me up with him.

"Do you know how to shag?"

"Depends on which country we're in."

"Pervert," Noah nudged me.

"I can do both actually," I hip-bumped him, and he continued to laugh.

"Alright, let's try," he pressed a button on the stereo and took my right hand, which made a buzz surge through me like an electric current. And he helped me along with the shag, a dance that I hadn't done since my all-girls boarding-school years where we_ had _to take dance class.

And I went along with it.

I blamed it on the drinks, but I was thinking fine.

Maybe that was the weirdest part.

I let myself have fun and smile, something I hadn't done in years really.

But then Noah leaned in during the wrap-around, and I was shocked to feel his lips against mine.

The music faded out of my ears, and I could only focus on Noah.

When we separated, we stared at each other for a long time.

I hadn't been sure if I had really kissed him or if it was just my imagination, but that kiss couldn't of been fake. Not with how good it felt, not how it covered me in Goosebumps and made me want to go weak in the knees.

"Did I just…" Noah trailed off.

I nodded, barely able to breathe much less talk.

Noah's arms released the wrap around and pulled me closer, never taking his brown eyes away from mine. And then he leaned in again, and I surprised him by meeting him half way.

He smiled into my lips, and he continued to kiss me as I wrapped my arms around his neck.

The kiss never ended, or it felt like it never did.

I wasn't sure if I kissed him for seconds or hours, but I knew that I never wanted to separate from him.

I had only felt like this with one person, and I had missed it so much that I had forgotten how wonderful it was. I had forgotten how it felt to melt into someone, to fit perfectly in their arms.

Before I even knew that we were moving, Noah gently laid down on the couch, and I pulled him back down to keep kissing him.

While he tugged on my tee shirt, my fingers quickly moved to unbutton his shirt.

As I pulled his shirt off, I felt something on his arm.

An impression.

As soon as I felt it, my breathing stopped, and my lips went slack.

I tried to tell myself that it was something else, but I knew that impression anywhere.

Noah pulled away, and his brown eyes were full of confusion.

But then he looked at his arm, where I was staring.

And he knew.

And I knew, too.

I couldn't let myself accept it, but I knew what was really happening.

That tattoo, I knew it.

I had laughed at it when I had first seen it, and I had quickly told the owner that it was sexy and edgy. I had often just stood with him and felt the tattoo, trying to imagine the pain that had come with such an impression. And I had often counted on it, knowing that I'd be safe once I could feel that impression close to me when he wrapped his arms around me.

"Take out your contacts" my voice shook.

Noah sat up, moving away from me to sit near my feet, and he held his right hand to his eye.

He stared up at the ceiling as he took them out, and I kept telling myself that I would see what I wanted to see.

But, deep down, I knew I wouldn't.

And then Noah looked back at me.

No, _Noah_ didn't look back at me.

_Percy_ did.

Even when I hated him and thought that _no one, _especially not a Seaweed brain, could beat out Luke, I knew that his eyes were beautiful. No one had that shade of green. That beautiful color could never be recreated, no matter how hard someone tried.

It was impossible to get it all together.

The flecks of dark blue towards the pupil.

The mixture of sea green and dark, freshly-mowed grass.

And the way the light hit them like they were priceless jewels.

There was only one person in the world that could eyes like those.

_Perseus Jackson._

"You're…!" I yelled, scrambling to get away from him but not able to finish the sentence.

"I was going to tell you," he tried, but I had already jumped off the couch.

"Everything," I ran my hand through my hair as I thought, "Everything! You played me! All this time, _you played me_!"

"It wasn't like that."

"Yes, it was! You knew! You-you," I felt myself hyperventilate.

I couldn't think.

I couldn't _breathe._

I kept telling myself not to think about it, not to have a panic attack.

But it was beating on my heart like a jackhammer.

"Annabeth," Percy jumped up from the couch and tried to get closer, but I pushed him away, harder than I probably should of.

Percy's eyes filled with shock, like I had betrayed him by doing that.

But I didn't care.

Percy had done the worst to me.

I pushed away my tears and grabbed the first pair of keys I could find on the countertop before running out the door.

And I slammed the door, letting the sound of the heavy metal meeting echo through the house.

* * *

><p><em><strong>Well…he <strong>_**told**_** her.**_

_**Check in next chapter to see what Annabeth does when driving away doesn't work anymore.**_


	11. Chapter 11

_**Annabeth:**_

"One iced latte, and a blueberry scone," the girl in the Starbucks drive through smiled wide at me, "Do you need anything else?"

"Nope, that's it," I handed her the money, and I quickly told her to keep the change so that I could drive away.

I basically inhaled the coffee, needing caffeine.

Last night, I had gotten in the car and just started driving. I didn't know where I was going, I just knew that I had to go. At about three AM, when I ran out of gas and had to pull into a gas station, I finally thought about everything that had happened.

Perseus Jackson.

How long had I missed him?

How long had I been looking for him?

And here he was.

Right under my nose, even _living _with me.

I should have been excited.

I mean, I loved him. And here he was.

But I felt so betrayed.

He had been here all along, listening to me as I told him that I still loved Percy. He knew who I was. He knew that I was Annabeth Chase, the girl who had been looking for him for so long. But… he didn't do anything.

He just….

He let me.

He let me cry myself to sleep. He let me work hard to find Percy. He let me continue to be broken when he was the piece that could fix me.

And that wasn't _my_ Percy.

I think that's what hurt the most.

This was Percy. He had all of the memories we shared. He looked the same. He had the same crazy spark to him. And his DNA still was that of Perseus Jackson, son of Sally Jackson and Poseidon.

But he wasn't _my Percy_.

_My Percy_ would never have done any of this to me. Even if he didn't love me anymore, he wouldn't put anyone through all this pain. He had too kind of a heart to do that. And his loyalty was held to his friends, even if they were old friends.

His loyalty now belonged to the Agency.

In all ways, this Percy was a perfect agent.

But I wasn't.

I couldn't give up my heart, and my loyalty would always belong to those that I loved. I couldn't just ignore that feeling in the pit of my stomach that reminded me time and time again that I had killed someone who was unarmed.

…I couldn't just be in the Agency anymore.

And that was where I was driving to.

I had called in to Anna sick, but she knew what I meant. She knew that I would still be coming through those doors of Zeus Airlines. She knew that I would take the elevator to the bottom floor and that I would come into her office, holding a folder.

She knew that I would resign today.

It would be easy really.

I would come home and pack my stuff, and I would have a jet waiting for me to take me wherever I wanted to go next. The Agency would help me find another job, if I even wanted another job. And, no matter where I went or what I did, the lavish pension would arrive every month in my mail box.

Because of my cover here, they'd say that they're sending me on a last job in some far off country, and I can return to the office one last time to say goodbye to any friends that I've made in North Carolina. But I have a feeling I won't.

So, I took in the scenery as I drove into the neighborhood that I had come to so many times. I remembered everything for a day where I'll wonder about my old, exciting career.

And I tried to think of where I'd go next.

California.

I'll spend some well-needed time with my dad for a while and then I'll get in order to take up on my half-brother's offer of working with him at his new architecture firm in New York. Or maybe I'll stay in San Francisco, get a job working as an architect and buy a townhouse where I can be near my family. I could even head out to LA, which is like an Architect's dream with all of the diversity.

Whatever it is, it won't be any of the Carolina's. And definitely not anywhere nearby, where I could run into Noah- er, Percy.

Maybe I could set up shop in some small town where I would never risk seeing anyone from the Agency again.

My car eased into the driveway perfectly, taking the spot that it always took.

Noah-or Percy, I _should _say- should be at work right now. That's why I'm finally back, so I don't have to run into him.

I fished through my bag and brought out my keys before getting out of the car.

I hurried into the house, wanting to get in and get out.

It took more energy than I had to push the door open, so it took a longer than I wished it would. But I managed in, and that was all that mattered.

I put my keys down loudly, and I was about to run upstairs to change and pack when I saw something that made me stop.

_Noah _wasn't sitting there.

_Percy_ was.

His hair was a crisp black, freshly dyed. His contacts were out, showing his beautiful green eyes, and he had washed off that artificial skin tone to show his olive skin underneath. And he was dressed like the Percy I knew, not Noah's professional chic.

I had known that Noah was Percy, but… it didn't feel real until now.

Until I had really seen Percy sitting there.

"Before you say anything," Percy stood quickly, but it was _impossible_ for me to say anything, "I want to say something."

I continued to stare, which I guess he took as a good sign.

"I'm Percy Jackson. I'm from New York. I am an only child. I've been through two major prophecies. And I fell in love with my best friend when I was sixteen."

Percy took a deep breath.

"When I was eighteen, I saw something I wasn't supposed to. The Witness Protection program was about to come and get me when the Agency found out about me, and they decided that they wanted me. So, they took me.

They…_took him_?

"And, when I was nineteen, I was finally allowed out on my own. They trusted me enough. It was then that I saw my best friend, the one that I had fallen in love with. And then I saw the guy I was supposed to be tailing. And I realized that I couldn't drag her into it. That I had to protect her," Percy wrung his arms.

My mouth had formed an 'O' without me realizing it.

He saw me?

When?

I tried to think of everything, but I could only think of one possible time.

I was looking at colleges, and I saw this guy… he looked like Percy a lot. That was what caught my eye… But his hair was blonde, and his eyes had been blue.

Oh my gods!

How didn't I see it?

"And then nine years later, I saw her _again_."

For the first time, Percy met my eyes.

"I should've told you."

I nodded, feeling my tears well inside of me.

"I'm sorry, Annabeth."

I couldn't hold back a tear this time, but I forced the others to stay.

"If you ever do that again, I promise I _will kill you_."

"Again?"

I smiled weakly, and Percy was like a flash to get to me.

He wrapped his arms around me, and I cried into his shoulder.

It was weird how, even after so long, I still fit into his grasp perfectly. Like a missing puzzle piece that had been gone far too long.

"I wasn't kidding about killing you," I laughed gently, and Percy smiled into my neck.

_**Cheesy?**_

_**Yes.**_

_**But it's better than another chapter where I prolong the inevitable of Annabeth finding out just who her fellow agent is, right?**_

_**Just because the infamous couple has finally made amends doesn't mean that this is the end though.**_

_**;D**_


	12. Chapter 12

_**Annabeth:**_

I jammed my key in the door and forced the heavy metal open.

I hadn't left the house since Friday, and I had still hesitated to leave today.

It was weird how everything picked up exactly how it left off ten years ago.

I had expected it would take some time to get used to the _Noah=Percy_ thing, but I had gotten used to it almost immediately.

And that made buying the dye and picking up the extra contacts hurt so much.

He'd be my Percy still, of course. But only to me.

The rest of the world would see him as the perfectly manicured Noah Harrison, just as they had before.

Yes, it'd be better to have Noah alive than Percy dead.

But I didn't want to say goodbye to Percy. I didn't want to say goodbye to the things only we can talk about, things that Noah isn't supposed to know. Or even his beautiful green eyes that I loved so much.

I didn't have a choice though.

I closed the front door with my foot and set the CVS bags down in the kitchen.

"Perce?" I called out, bringing out the many dyes and spray tans that I had been sent out to buy.

Percy was under house arrest, in a way, by the order of Anna. No one could see Percy. Not when he is on a hit list for something he didn't even know he had done. So, until he was once again Noah Harrison, the curtains were drawn and the door closed.

I hadn't had a problem with staying in the house all weekend, until I found out that any errands had to be done by me.

And this happened to be errand weekend, leaving me to go all over town today.

Laundry, which Percy didn't trust me to do. Groceries, we were out of that weird blue soda that Percy loves so much. Hair dye. Pick up some new contacts from the optometrist who especially makes them. And then I somehow ended up in an insanely long line for my favorite burger place…. and then found out that they were out of my favorite food.

"Just putting on a shirt," Percy yelled out, and, as if on cue, I heard the sound of someone running down the modern stairs.

Holding the dyes, since I had gotten to the store and forgotten which color he said I needed to buy, I looked back to him as he continued to button up a blue shirt, his hair wet from the shower, with the black beginning to wash off.

He pointed towards the dark brown dye, and I shoved the others boxes away.

"I am dreading this," Percy nodded towards the dyes as he began to towel dry his hair, taking some of the black out of his hair to reveal the dull brown underneath.

"Me, too," I picked up a box of contacts, moving them over in my hand, wanting to throw them across the room.

"You okay?" he laughed, and I shrugged.

"I don't get how you can do this."

"It's not fun, I promise you that," Percy laughed.

"I guessed that much," my nose crinkled as I began to open the box, even able to smell the scent of the dye from here.

"Need some help? I've been doing this for years, remember?"

"I think I can mix some dye, Percy," I rolled my eyes.

Wait, is it this that mixes? Or is it this that is extremely flammable?

_Crap._

I slid the gloves and began to study the instructions.

"You're sure you don't need help?"

"I'm _fine,_ Percy."

"Annabeth?"

"What?"

"That can get you high if you mix that, Annabeth."

"Who says I wasn't trying to get high?"

Percy raised his eyebrow as if to ask if I was high already.

"Fine," I shoved the box towards him, and he expertly started to mix it all together, leaving me to stare in shock.

"Alright, so, all you need to do is mix it in my hair, and I have to wait ten minutes before washing it out. Oh, and did you pick up that blue soda?"

"In the trunk with your suits. What is it with the blue soda? Can't you just buy some food coloring or something? Why do we have to specifically drive to a certain store on the edge of town so that we can buy the Japanese soda? And, speaking of that, why are the Japanese drinking blue soda?"

Percy started laughing.

"You know, I really missed you. Because I even missed that."

I hit the top of his head.

"And that."

"Shut up," I told him as I pulled the towel around his neck and reached for the dye to rub it in his hair.

_**Percy,**_

"What are you doing, Perce?"

"Noah, remember?"

"Sorry," Annabeth nodded as she put down the newspaper and reached for a cup of coffee.

"It feels weird to be Noah."

"You've been Noah for ten years. You'd think being Percy would be the thing that felt weird," Annabeth smiled at me.

Yesterday, she had freaked out when she had to dye my hair and help me not poke my eye out with the contacts. But she seems to have forgotten about it, or at least she was pretending to be fine for me. Either way, I was the only one who openly did not like being Noah Harrison.

"I guess," I walked away from the mirror and went back to adding sugar to my coffee.

"I was thinking, what are we going to do with my room now that I basically moved into yours? I mean, I basically even moved my clothes over."

"We could always just leave as it is, for a room when you get really mad at me. I am a Seaweed Brain, remember?"

Annabeth smiled and kissed my cheek.

_Buzz. Buzz. Buzz._

Annabeth went back to her purse to get to her cell phone just as mine started to beep.

_One New Message from Anna_

I pressed accept on the cell phone and scanned through the little type.

_U better be feeling better. Got a job for you and Annabeth._

_-Anna_

_Oh, and Annabeth didn't turn in your notice. So, I'm guessing you're back together? Congrats, PJ._

"A job? It's been forever since we've finally gotten one of those," Annabeth smiled as she shoved her phone back in her purse.

"And Anna finally got her way of me telling you."

"She _wanted_ you to tell me, and you _didn't_?" Annabeth crossed her arms, clearly not planning on really forgiving me any time in the near future.

"I'm a Seaweed Brain."

_**I will not be updating until I finally get through the Agency Person thing, which I am starting to regret though I got some awesome characters.**_

_**So, it'll be at least a week or two until the next update.**_


	13. Chapter 13

_**Annabeth,**_

A cruel and menacing laugh escaped Alan's thin lips as he placed his foot on my chest to keep my down.

But it's not like I had much of a choice anyway.

The cut on my hip was losing blood rapidly, and I could feel my vision start to become foggy.

But I didn't need myself at one hundred percent to feel it.

His lessen of grip.

His vulnerabilities.

His cockiness.

It was all of those things that surprised him when I summed up all of my strength to twist his ankle, making him fall on top of me.

Here's where it got hard.

I pushed his two hundred pounds off of me, breaking his nose to stun him from doing anything, and I fumbled around for the gun that had slipped away from him when he fell.

Aiming the gun at his skull, I slowly began to stand up, making sure I didn't end up blowing everything by getting woozy and falling.

"You wouldn't."

"You're right, we need you alive," I aimed towards his waist, and his face ran pale.

He raised his hands in surrender, and I let myself smile.

Job completed.

_Well, if Percy will ever show up._

As if on cue of me thinking about him, the roof-access door swung open, revealing Percy at the doorframe.

A gun raised towards Alan, Percy began to make his way towards me.

"You're bleeding."

"I noticed."

He threw me a baggie of Ambrosia.

"You've got to stop doing that," he nodded towards the cut, and I ignored it.

Every time I got hurt, which was a lot recently, Percy would stop and be protective again.

It had taken a while for our normal work load to appear again, but we weren't in our old groove. Sure, we worked together like clockwork, but it was hard to concentrate on beating someone up when you're boyfriend/girlfriend is starting to lose nearby.

"Where's the helicopter?" I asked as I quickly ate the square of ambrosia, feeling my body heal itself.

"Long story."

"What'd you do?" I asked as I shoved the baggy into my pocket, pulling out the invincible hand-cuffs I loved so much, and I began the process of putting them around Alan's wrists, feeling around for weapons as I did so.

"Just give it a minute," Percy's green eyes stayed locked on the sky, but I could hear the helicopter before he could even manage to block out the sunlight.

I pulled Alan to his feet, which would have been hard even without him struggling.

But, before I could reprimand him, the cuffs had done their job by tightening around his wrists.

"Don't struggle," I told him after he winced.

_**Percy,**_

"_It's her or me."_

_A gun was raised to Annabeth's blonde curls, and she mouthed 'I'm sorry'._

_But, somehow, I knew that she didn't need to be apologizing. Whatever had caused this hadn't been her fault in anyway._

"_Do it," a finger began to pull back the trigger._

_I dropped my gun._

"_And the other one."_

_I ripped my shirt open to get a the holster, and I threw it down._

"_Good boy."_

I woke up abruptly, my heart pounding.

"Percy?"

I looked to my left to see Annabeth's grey eyes beginning to flutter open.

She's okay.

And it was just a dream.

But it didn't shake away the feeling of fear coursing through me.

"What's wrong?" Annabeth propped herself up on her elbows to look at me, clicking on a bedside lamp in the process.

I hesitated.

She looked perfect.

But she always looked perfect to me, even when her hair was insane and her eyes were foggy and tired.

"A dream," I smiled weakly, pushing Annabeth's blonde hair out of her eyes.

"You mean a nightmare."

I nodded, and Annabeth continued to stare.

"You're not going to tell me, are you?"

"How about this? I'll tell you when you stop getting in trouble."

"I'm fine now," Annabeth sat up in bed and pulled her floppy tee shirt up to show her left hip, where the cut had been before.

But it didn't matter.

This time we stopped it.

Could we stop it next time?

I was tired of taking the risk like this all the time.

"_Now_."

Annabeth moaned, knowing she couldn't win.

"I'm going to the Seaweed Brain Escape room."

I pulled Annabeth back by her wrist.

And she paused before speaking.

"I don't like it either, Perce," she put her hand on my arm, knowing that there was a scar there, making me feel guilty.

"Gods, we need to retire."

Annabeth laughed, knowing how slim the chances were that we actually would.

"Yeah right. Us?" Annabeth leaned back to rest her head on my shoulder, closing her eyes as she thought over the possibility.

Retiring.

That'll be the day…

We get a huge settlement with enough money that we couldn't even imagine spending it all, and we got placement in wherever we wanted. We were set up with jobs if we wanted, not that we'd ever need them. And it was perfect I guess.

But there was something about leaving the Agency.

It was so…_final_. So permanent.

It was all we had ever really known. What would we do without that?

"I know, right?" I laughed.

Annabeth laughed as she slid back under the covers.

"How about we skip out next week? A, sort of, part time retirement. Just drive away and find some small little beach town where I can be Percy Jackson without having to lock myself up somewhere," I kissed the top of her head, making her smile.

"That's a deal."

_**Annabeth,**_

I shoved my small grey suitcase into the trunk of Percy's car, and I ignored the inquisitive glances from the next door neighbor.

I was used to it.

Noah and I had been like a soap opera to everyone here.

First we were old friends.

Then they noticed we started liking each other.

And, one weekend, we suddenly closed the curtains and locked the doors. And we were all over each other after that.

It was bad for us to have attention like this, but there wasn't much I could do about it anyway.

And, besides, deep down, I liked it.

It made me feel like I was normal, or normal enough. I was like everyone else. I had nosy neighbors and a boyfriend that I loved to death, even if he could drive me crazy sometimes. And I got away from work with a weekend retreat with my boyfriend.

And, even more, Percy liked it, too.

Sometimes, it was hard to find things that truly made Percy happy like this does.

"Did you get the hotel?" Percy, having just finished packing, came from the house to put everything in the car.

Well, _he_ called it packing.

I knew it was really just shoving stuff into a bag.

But he had always called it packing.

So, I played along.

"Yeah, and you remembered to tell Anna we're leaving, right?" I asked as I moved around Percy's bag.

"Of course, Annabeth."

I nodded towards the trunk, silently telling Percy to take a few steps back, and I slammed the door closed.

"So, we're clear to go?"

"Yeah, just go lock the door," I nodded towards the house as I slid into the passenger seat.

_First of all…_

I slid my blackberry out of my jean pocket, and I slid the plastic back off.

I pulled the battery out and shoved it in the hidden pocket which I was supposed to use to hide a gun.

"Much better," I smiled to myself as I typed in the quick code to lock the pocket with the gun and the battery to my cell phone, and I finally let myself enjoy my time off.

When we were at home, plans weren't permanent. At any time, we could be called.

And there would be another destination. Another flight, or another drive. Another loaded gun. Another target.

So, time off was like the Twilight Zone to me since it had been almost three years since I had actually gotten it.

"You ready?" Percy smiled as he got into the driver's seat, and I smiled as I nodded.

"Definitely."

I turned on the radio loudly, so loudly that I missed it as Anna called the first time on Percy's phone.

Or the second time.

Or the third time.

But I did hear it when the engines cut off when we tried to start the car again after stopping to get some food.

"What the Hades?" Percy tried to crank up the car again.

Same problem.

And then my eyes drifted to Percy's cell phone, which was blinking with missed calls.

I moaned as I reached for it, knowing that this was the end of our _'great weekend'_.

"This is an Agency car, right?" I asked as I looked at the four letters of the contact that had called him so many times.

"Yeah, why?" he looked over to me.

Percy groaned as he looked at the cell phone, knowing what it meant.

"Perfect," I pressed the button to dial Anna's number, and I handed him the cell phone.

She answered on the first ring.

_**This is not what I was planning for this chapter, but why not?**_


	14. Chapter 14

_**Annabeth,**_

"Percy," I held onto the handle in the car, praying to every god that I could think of that I wouldn't die like this, "Slow down!"

Percy answered by speeding up the car, and I quickly adjusted my seatbelt again so that I would survive when Percy's bad driving ended up risking our short lives.

Do I even have a will?

I need one.

Percy slammed on the brakes as we reached the Agency, and I locked the doors before he could get out.

"Calm, down, Percy."

He stopped to take a deep breath, putting his head back on the headrest, and I let my breathing even out after thinking I was about to die earlier.

"Calmed," he nodded as he pressed the unlock button and pushed the door open.

I scrambled to follow after him while putting my stupid blackberry back together, and I really only caught up to him when he had to pause by the elevators.

Our coworkers (the normal ones) stared at us like we were a freak show in a circus, but Percy didn't notice it as he boarded the elevator.

And the line that was forming behind us stayed away, meaning Percy could do what he really wanted to do.

He quickly put in his access key to get to B-2, where a frantic Anna had called us repeatedly so that we could come and see some important message.

I didn't know what honestly was so important, but I was here anyway.

Anna was never good with details. It was always, "Come in, and I'll tell you," when it came to Anna, and we were used to it. But, having been an agent herself, she knew the unwritten rules. When you've got time off, you find a different Agent. No matter what, it's a different Agent. That's just what you do.

Unless the world is about to be destroyed because they weren't the Agents on duty, you don't call them.

So, this was a lose-lose situation for us.

The elevator ride was longer than it should be, and it was filled with silence.

Finally, the elevator door dinged open, and Percy did the same fast walk he did before, making me almost have to run to walk into Anna's office at the same time as him.

"What the hell?" Percy plopped down in the chair.

"You look great, Annabeth. Have you lost weight? You look really good," Anna asked as I sat down in the other chair, making an obvious point of ignoring Percy, not that I blamed her.

"No, if anything, I've gained weight. Percy taught me how to make those blue cookies that I am just in love with."

"With the sprinkles in them?"

"Yeah."

"When I was pregnant with Tony, I made Percy make them and bring them over all the time," Anna smiled, making Percy continue to stare at her.

Finally, Anna looked towards Percy, pushing her black hair behind her ear.

"You suck at small talk, Percy."

He continued to stare.

"Fine," Anna reached for a tablet, "I thought you might want this."

Percy took the tablet she offered, and he scanned through it, his eyes getting wide with every word he read.

"No way," he whispered as he looked at it.

"What is it?"

"You know your first mission here, right?" Anna asked as she crossed her arms.

"Yeah, the old guy who flirted with me."

"_Mr. Money_," Anna laughed, "We've finally got him."

"And more importantly, _Verde_."

"Verde?" my eyes widened.

"You're not the only agent Mr. Money has flirted with. And she got more out of him than just a lighter."

"He works with Verde?"

"_For_ Verde," Percy corrected me, "Verde is boss. No questions. If you get to high up…"

Percy motioned across his neck.

"Only they die in a slower way than decapitation," Anna shook her head.

"Wait, if Verde's so important, wouldn't you want someone higher up than us?"

Anna looked to Percy, telling me that it was Percy's turn to tell me.

"We've been studying Verde for a while," Percy took a deep breath, "And we found out that he's the reason I'm here."

_**Percy,**_

"Shut up, Liza," Blaze's hair began to flame.

"You're just jealous that this," she held up her sister's hair, "Keeps you locked up in Boston."

Blaze closed her eyes tightly, making her hair burn Liza's hand.

"Ow!" she released her sister's hair, and Blaze smiled as she came to sit beside Annabeth.

Blaze and Liza.

They were the twin daughters of an Agent, Vivian, and Hephaestus.

When Vivian died five years ago, they had no immediate family. After a long time of talking about it, a group made a vote, which I was a part of. We decided that the two girls would be taken care of by the Agency and sent to Camp every summer.

It was hard to see them as eighteen now, not when I had met them when they were thirteen.

I used to help with Liza and Blaze when they were younger, though I helped Blaze out more.

Elizabeth looked like her mother, and she had most of the human blood between her and Blaze. Her hair was a light blonde that fell into her green eyes, and she had the same attractive features as Vivian. But she hadn't inherited Vivian's gentle heart.

Unless you knew that they were twins, you wouldn't think that Blaze was Liza's sister.

Her name was actually Amelia Feu Dubois. Her hair was fire red, with orange dyed in for effect. Her eyes were brown like chocolate, and she had a pierced her eyebrow for her eighteenth birthday. Her skin was a dark tan since it was the end of the summer and she had gotten to go to Camp instead of having to stay in the Agency schools and such.

Liza got to move in with an older Agent who was like her foster dad in Chicago, but Blaze couldn't quite go anywhere really.

At least, not now anyway.

When her dad had first claimed her, her power had come to light.

When she got mad, her hair didn't just _look_ fire red. It _became_ fire.

With every year, she got better about it.

But she was in no shape to go back to a normal life.

But, from what I could tell, that's not what Blaze wanted. She liked her current life, especially if that meant getting away from her annoying twin sister.

I wasn't sure what had gotten Blaze her name. Whether it was from her middle name, which meant fire in French, or if it was like a blaze, she had been called Blaze for almost as long as I had known her.

I didn't know how Liza got on this mission, but she was here.

Blaze was obvious.

Despite her young age, she was one of our best agents.

"Liza," Annabeth narrowed her eyes at the blonde as she began braid Blaze's hair back, which kept it from turning to fire unless she got extremely angry.

Annabeth and Blaze had become friends when they had both worked for the Agency in Boston.

Liza stretched her legs out on the plane seat that her sister had been sitting in before.

"Why are you two always on her side?" Liza motioned towards me and Annabeth.

"We don't, Liza," I told her as I pressed the play button for the movie, which put some ironic spy comedy on.

"Everybody treats her better because she's a freak."

"No, they treat me better because I'm nice!"

"Guys, I'm against both of you if you keep fighting," Annabeth stopped them.

"Fine, what do we have on Verde?"

"What is it with your obsession with Verde?" Liza asked as she got up to get a drink.

"He's the _target_, Liza. And why do you never care about him? He _killed_ Mom."

"_He _didn't kill Mom! Jenkins did!" Liza spun around quickly.

"Jenkins was a hit man _for_ Verde!"

Liza glared at her sister.

_**Annabeth,**_

"They make me feel so old," Percy nodded towards Blaze, who was asking for another key from the hotel clerk for our room after a huge fight with her sister that made it so that she couldn't stand sharing a room with her.

"Hey, did Verde kill Vivian Dubois? I didn't know he's been in power long enough for that."

"Evidence points that way," Percy shrugged.

"How old is he? Or is it even a guy?"

"No one knows. We only know he's a guy because we intercepted messages where they referred to him as a guy," Percy shrugged as he pressed the elevator button again.

"What happened to Liza? I never remembered her like this," I motioned towards the irritable blonde.

"Don't know," Percy continued as we boarded the elevator alone and pressed the floor for our room, "She went to England for her last semester of high school, and she's been like that ever since."

I nodded as I waited for the elevator to reach our room.

"I'm nervous, too."

Percy looked at me, shocked by what I was saying.

But he didn't deny it, he just nodded.

"Is it wrong to want to kill him?"

"Other than Liza, I don't know anyone who doesn't."

Percy smiled, almost laughing.

"I guess that's why she's here. To remind us to capture him, not _kill_ him."

"We all have our motives."

"Blaze's mom was killed. I was kidnapped. What's yours?"

"He tried to kill my boyfriend."

Percy smiled as he kissed the top of my head.

_If only we had known that Verde was about to give Percy another motive..._


	15. Chapter 15

_**Annabeth,**_

"If we ever have kids, we're having _one_," Percy whispered in my ear, motioning towards Blaze and Liza.

I wanted to give Liza the benefit of the doubt, though it was getting harder every moment.

With every passing second, I was one step closer to calling Anna and demanding that she be on a flight back to Chicago in the next hour.

Liza had been a cute kid when I met her. She had blonde hair that refused to be controlled, and she would just look up at you with those big green eyes and you were like a hypnotized slave, doing whatever she asked. She had always been smiling, almost like it was a medical condition.

And no words could describe Blaze.

"Deal," I nodded as I watched the two sisters go to extremes to avoid each other in the small coffee shop.

They were supposed to be acting inconspicuous, but they had quickly become the first thing you notice, especially when Blaze's hair was beginning to flame as her sister taunted her.

Percy and I were happily across the street, watching from the hotel lobby.

In the last twenty-four hours, I had learned everything we knew about Verde.

That no one knew his real name, only that he was called Verde for the green tattoo on his neck, which he would give to his high-up henchmen and such. It was like his card, and it was one of the highest honors you could ever get as a villian.

That he somehow knew everything about the Agency though he had never been in it.

And that he was the ultimate mob-boss who ran basically the entire world, though we're pretty sure he makes his main residence in an expensive mansion in Spain that is impossible to get in, not that we could even find it.

Verde was the ultimate mission, the kind that you spend your entire career waiting for.

He was a legend, the kind that you study when you first join the Agency.

I tried to imagine what he looked like.

Was he handsome?

Was he young? Or was he old?

Was he strong? Or was he weak from having body guards take care of him for the last few years?

Usually, I didn't have to ever come face-to-face with these bosses. When their henchmen were wiped out, they accepted defeat and started planning their saving grace that would let them get off. They came quietly, sometimes even making jokes as they get in the transport.

But I had a feeling that Verde was going to be different.

"Are you nervous?" I asked Percy, remembering that it had been Verde's operation that had brought Percy to where he was.

"Not nervous. Worried, I guess," Percy smiled weakly as he laced his fingers through mine.

"Don't be," I tried, but it wasn't convincing enough.

"It's nothing," Percy told me, trying to calm me down.

_I hate when he lies to me._

I wanted to tell him that it wasn't nothing, but I decided against it.

He wouldn't listen to me anyway.

"What time do we leave tomorrow?"

"Sunset. We're going to _the caves_," Percy explained, "It's the only time we'd stand a chance."

_The Caves_ were legendary to the Agency.

In this small European beach town, The Caves have taken a second place to beach-tourism. And they were quickly forgotten about, being left for just about anyone.

Like one of those spy movies, the best confrontations happen there.

"He's in _The Caves_?"

"Verde likes things dramatic," Percy shrugged as he looked back at his laptop.

"Are you sure we have to bring Liza?"

"She's going with you."

"What?" I quickly turned back to look at him, ignoring how people from all over the hotel were staring at me now, "I thought I was with you."

"If they were together, they'd be caught in seconds. Anna didn't take that into account," Percy shook his head as he looked towards the laptop.

"But how did I get Liza?"

"I need Blaze. You're going to get the files, I'm getting the jerk, remember? And I need Blaze's fire, no pun intended," Percy smiled weakly as he opened a mini packet of pretzels and glanced over to the coffee shop, where Blaze was sipping at a cup of tea to calm her nerves from spending too much time with her sister.

I hate when he's right…

"Let's get this over with then."

* * *

><p><em><strong>Percy,<strong>_

As I listened to the waves break on the shore, I realized that this was the first time since we had gotten off the plane that I had heard the waves without Liza and Blaze's fighting polluting the calming sound. The sound brought me back to Camp when it rained, how the waves were horrible and how Annabeth would cling onto me as we'd watch the water stream down the window pane.

But I had to remind myself to come back to reality where Annabeth and I were probably about to kill people, not stare at the rain and talk.

"The caves," Blaze whistled as she looked up at the intimidating structure.

The cliff ran along the beach, with a certain characteristic that had made the beach a favorite.

I didn't know why the caves had formed, but I'm pretty sure Annabeth could get me a detailed-Athenian-Explanation that could take hours if she had the time.

But I did know that they were here and that they were secluded and dangerous without the henchmen who were trained to kill us as soon as we took one wrong step.

"Here goes nothing," Annabeth began as she started to make her way across the tourist bridge to the caves, and I had to force myself not to be protective like I usually was.

Annabeth could handle herself.

Better than I could.

Blaze channeled her power and made her red hair begin to glow to shed light as we came into the damp cave.

Annabeth expertly maneuvered across the rough terrain to the real reason this cave was known.

The offices inside.

Who had made the offices, no one will ever really know. We just knew it was there.

It had started with drug dealers using it, and, as the '_Drug Business'_ was bought up, it was given to someone else. Over the last ten years, these caves had probably seen about three hundred different bosses who called this the office. Well, until Verde finally got a hold of everything.

He had come in about ten years ago, but he hadn't been truly powerful until about three years ago.

Now, he was the ultimate mob boss.

Whether the people knew it or not, their businesses really tracked back to him.

From drugs to simple organized crime gangs.

Everything.

It was Verde's empire.

He controlled everything.

From politicians in Germany to a drug dealer in Miami that we had caught last month.

Somehow, there were traces back to Verde.

In the last ten years, he had built his extensive empire.

One day, there would be a new kid. Another empire and another boss. Another empire and another boss. But, for now, it was Verde's.

"This is you," I nodded towards the metal door in the rock wall, where Annabeth would be able to get enough information that could create world peace or a third World War.

Annabeth nodded as she pressed a button on her headset, creating a light.

"Call us if you need us," she tapped the microphone on the Bluetooth device.

I nodded as Blaze came to stand beside me, and Liza went to stand beside Annabeth.

"Good luck," Blaze smiled at Annabeth, but her gaze rested on her sister long enough to tell me that she was trying to tell her sister to be careful, even if they weren't close enough to come out and say that.

"Make sure she doesn't cause a wild fire, Percy."

I couldn't tell if that was a jab at Blaze or a warning for me to keep her twin safe.

Either way, I took it and nodded.

"Let's go," I nodded towards the turn that Blaze and I needed to go.

_**Annabeth,**_

I forced the heavy door open, the last one, and I quickly scooted in, Liza right after me.

I hadn't cared too much about security cameras.

There weren't many security guys taking care of Verde today, we had made sure of that, and, if there were any, it was better they see me instead of Percy. A girl in the files was bad, but a boy heading towards the boss was a million times worse.

At the end of the day, it was about the mission.

"Get the lights on," I nodded towards Liza, snapping off my flashlight as Liza flipped a switch for the lights.

So maybe Liza isn't a good person, but I never said she was bad at taking orders.

"What are we looking for?" Liza asked as she started walking towards the rows and rows of files.

I almost laughed as I walked right past her and took a seat at the desk.

"_We_ aren't doing anything. _You're_ look out."

"Look out? What are we? Thirteen and getting ready for a slumber party prank?" Liza complained.

"Do it, Liza."

She mumbled something as she went back to do as I said.

I _did_ need a look-out, I guess, but it would only help me by being ready to shoot the person. I was trapped, so Liza honestly could just go look through the paper files. But it was hard to work with her, and this was the biggest mission of my career. I couldn't screw it up because Liza kept breathing down my neck.

My hands covered in the plastic gloves, I pressed the power button on the computer.

Calling on the classes I had taken when I joined the Agency, I bypassed the security and got into the files.

They were always so cocky, thinking that no one would ever get this far or that they would never get passed the security if they did. So, it was all here. Everything incriminating. All right here, all about to be on my the Agency hard drive at any moment.

There are times when I hate my job.

Like when I couldn't go out of town for the weekend with my boyfriend.

Or when I had to cancel my sister's surprise party for me because I had to fly to Monte Carlo for a job.

Or how I would be consumed with nightmares some nights about that point where my job was more of a fancy name for a hit man.

But this was one of those moments when I loved my job.

I plugged my silver Flash Drive into the computer, and I quickly began to pile up things on the small device.

As I watched the green bar telling me how much time I had left, I began to think of what the Agency would do with it. How many agents would be sent out. Who would be caught, which Agents on the inside would find themselves in hell.

I had just about everything until I reached a file with _vert_ in all capital letters.

Vert.

French for Green.

Verde.

_Spanish_ for Green.

I slid the flash drive out and put another one to transfer from the computer.

"Hurry up," I mumbled, knowing that I needed to get to Percy and help him out by now.

"Annabeth, you almost done?"

"Almost, Liza. One last thing," I forced the annoyance out of my voice.

_Forget what I was beginning to think about Liza being a good Agent._

I could hear Liza coming towards me, and I ignored my impulse to tell her that she needed to get back.

We were almost done anyway, and the only time I'd need it next was when I looked at the screen to check the hallways to see if I needed to be ready to empty a round into somebody.

"Vert?" Liza asked, standing right behind me now.

I could almost feel her breathing.

"Yeah."

"That's French, right?" something crawled into Liza's voice.

Something I didn't recognize.

Fear?

Suddenly, I felt uncomfortable. Like I should stand. Like I should hide the browser. Or _something._

Finally, I forced the words off my tongue.

"For green."

It was all a blur, but I noticed the green tattoo on her neck of a four leaf clover right before the world turned to black.

I noticed it too late.


	16. Chapter 16

_**Annabeth,**_

_What the hell?_

As I began to regain consciousness, I still felt like I was dreaming.

I was in… _a cave_.

And Liza was pulling me through, not caring if I bumped into painful things on the way.

And then there was that tattoo on her neck.

As the memories telling me how I got here came back, so did the horrible pain from where she hit my neck.

But I pushed past the pain to work it all together.

Over the last few months, Spain had been dead sort of. No craziness with Verde's mob, nothing. It was peaceful, like he wasn't even there.

So, where was he?

Where had gotten the most activity?

_London._

Where Liza had just finished up high school.

It had been assumed by the team who is dedicated to watching Verde in the Agency that he was currently moving around Europe and that he would have gone to London at some point. But somehow it had never clicked.

That Liza could have run into the elusive Verde while she had spent a semester there.

Maybe it was because she was _the Liza_.

When she was thirteen, she had been an orphan, and she had come to live in the Agency. A lot of people had lived underground where the Agency hid, sometimes for training or sometimes because it was their only option, but Liza and Blaze had been different.

They had been like the Agency's daughters, and almost every Agent saw them as family.

If anything, Blaze had always been the wild child, the one we needed to watch.

Liza had always just been… _normal_.

Well, normal for the Agency.

She was a demigod but had no special power.

She was pretty but not too noticeable to be a good Agent.

She was good at her training, but she was in no way the best.

Liza had always blended in to the background.

_And people in the background always make the best traitors…_

With every passing second, my mind became more alert, and my body began to regain its strength.

But the blinding shock was too much for me to really think.

So, okay, Liza had all of the opportunity to do this.

But where was her motive?

Her mother had been killed by Verde, he was the reason that she had become an orphan. Because of him, she was put into the life she complained about so much. So, maybe Blaze's fire hair was reason that they had to stay in the Underground town back in New York for so long. But Verde was the reason that they were living in the Agency anyway.

Liza should hate Verde, even more than she seems to hate Blaze.

So, why does she have his mark?

The lucky clover tattoo.

No matter how much I hoped that she was a triple agent, not a double agent, the tattoo removed any hope of that.

Verde was smarter than that, and you basically had to be either his favorite, most trusted person in the world or related to him to get that tattoo.

No one could even fake that.

He gave it to you himself.

Only he knew the special trick to make the design right.

I let out a high-pitched _eep_ in pain as Liza pulled me over a sharp rock.

"So you're up," Liza smiled down at me, though it was hard to believe that the little thirteen year old girl who almost fainted every time she saw a paper cut was smiling at my blood being all over the cave floor. Liza pulled me up, taking no precautions to not cause me pain as she did so, and she kept a tight grip on me as she lead me through the cave.

She definitely knew where she was going, I could tell that much at least through my haze.

I suddenly thought over it all. She had tried to seem like this was all new to her, but, even then, I knew she had been here before. I had just thought it had probably been coming to hook up with a boy during a European vacation around here.

"Verde? I asked, trying to keep up with the fast-paced blonde in case she decided we were doing better when I was unconscious. But I couldn't stop staring at the green ink on her neck.

"You already know, Annabeth," she tightened her already firm grip on me.

But, by doing that, she brought me closer to the gun she had lifted from me.

Gently, I began to work my way to where I would be able to move my arm, and I began to think of a plan.

_One._

_Two._

_Three._

I elbowed her nose, hearing the crack that told me it was broken. I kicked her feet from under her, and I quickly scrambled to get the two guns, even though I could sense the concussion that was making it hard for me to work well.

But Liza was two steps ahead of me.

She kicked my already hurt torso, which was scraped up from all of the dragging to how she got me here. The pain knocked me back, which didn't help by already hurt skull. Before I could even get my brain functioning again to even think about moving, Liza grabbed the gun.

I delivered a blow to her knee, where I knew she would always have trouble after a childhood incident, and the eighteen year old fell down with a screech in pain. While she was trying to get herself to stop screaming, I got the gun and aimed to shoot.

Frantic, Liza knocked the gun out of my hand, sending it flying across the cave and breaking it, sending out one last shoot before the pieces came apart.

There should have been a craze to get the only gun left.

But we both knew it was over now.

Up until the time I was about twenty-three, I lived with my half-brother, Darren, who was studying to become a doctor. And, since I had no social life once so ever, I was Darren's any-time study partner. As a daughter of Athena, I remembered some of it.

Including the spot on my arm that could bleed out.

And I had three hours until there was no point of return.

_**Percy,**_

Wiping the blood off my face, I closed the door to the room where the security guards had come after me.

About half an hour ago, it had suddenly happened. They had appeared from nowhere. Half went after Blaze, and half went after me. Luckily, I had them cornered in the bathroom, and the few that withstood my water abilities weren't strong in any other way.

I hadn't heard from Blaze.

But, if I knew Blaze at all, she was fine.

"Percy?"

I turned to see Blaze walking towards me.

It was like the _'Bad-Ass-Girl-Montage'_ in a teen movie as she walked towards me.

Her black cargo pants were covered in ashes, and her red hair was still steaming, though it was now in a ponytail behind her head. She had a black streak on her left cheek from the fire, and she had that cocky grin of "_Told you so_". Her jacket was no longer with her, and her black tank top was singed at the bottom, though part of me wondered if she had done that on purpose.

"How big of a fire?"

"Not our problem."

I raised my eyebrows, but she shook her head, telling me that she wasn't going to talk about it.

"Do you have any idea how long I spent trying to find the perfect leather jacket? I don't care how long Liza complains, I'm going to kill Verde."

"Agreed," I told her as I put my gun back into my belt.

I followed after her as she looked down the hall, where the cell phone that had the layout of the caves had told us to go before it had lost signal.

"I checked out the security while I was at it," Blaze told me as we continued to walk.

"And?"

"He's got maybe three guys in there. They've probably left by now to go check out where the other guys are, but they shouldn't be too bad. And I didn't see Liza and Annabeth in the file room, so they must be on their way to us."

I nodded, and Blaze suddenly stopped short.

"Here it is," she nodded towards a door in the rocky wall.

This was the first time I had ever seen Blaze nervous.

I had been there when she graduated high school. When she officially became an agent. Even when she broke her commitment phobia and started to date Cal, her friend from the Agency that everyone had known she was in love with for years.

"You cover me."

Blaze nodded, raising her gun.

The first shot was dedicated to the lock on the door.

And it wasn't the last.

Blaze was wrong. There were _four_ henchmen.

And no Verde.

Before I could do anything, Blaze shot the four with only two shots.

I turned back to look at her, shock on my face.

"Practicing. I told you, I'm _killing_ Verde."

I nodded, knowing that there was honestly no other way. We couldn't bring him in. This was a hit job, no matter what they labeled it.

"Let's do it," I started walking towards the edge of the room to get to where it became caves again.

He just stood there, looking over it at the water in the dark night.

He was so…_young_.

Twenty-four, or at least around there.

He had come into this when he was _fourteen_, and he had started sending out his hit man at about the same time.

Verde.

Green.

It definitely described him.

His hair was St. Patrick's Day green and formed into a Mohawk on the top of his head. He dressed to show his scars, just about every one that he could show without having to just take off all of his clothes. And then his eyes, that darkness to them that you only get when you see someone die.

But his tattoos make Verde.

There was his signature four leaf clover on his neck. But that almost seemed lame in comparison to the others.

There were black-green thorns wrapping around his right arm, going down to his fingers where there was blood dripping from a few of the thorns. Thanks to the purposeful rips in his shirts, I could see part of the tattoo of a raven on his waist. And there was a tattoo on his chest, where I could only see _Me Encanta _which meant I love in Spanish.

"Hi," his smile was cruel, and his gaze washed over Blaze, "So you're the other Dubois. Not what I was expecting at all."

His smirk made Blaze raise her gun even higher and aim for his dark green eyes.

"Do it. I dare you."

"_Callar_," she spat in Spanish as she pressed the trigger.

Verde's smile spread as he quickly took out his gun and took a shot, hitting the same bullet that had been aimed for him.

"_Callar_?" Verde laughed, "Try again."

And she did.

She took a shot to the cave wall, shocking Verde, and, while he was moving because he thought she was going to shoot again, she snapped the gun out of his hand and threw it off the cliff.

"_Aumentar_!" Blaze took a step closer to him, staring directly into the eyes that had watched as Jenkins left, his mission to kill Blaze's mother and even Blaze if she was there.

And he did step up.

The three of us went at it like cats and dogs until Verde flipped me over, and I couldn't get myself to move.

They didn't even seem to notice that I was out of the fight.

If anything, it was easier for them without me.

They fought like it was the last thing that they would ever do, each with their own little personal motive for wanting to kill the other.

I began to get up, trying to sneak up to the two young adults.

Finally, I hit his neck, and he fell back, straight into Blaze's arms.

"Impressive."

"You've got the cuffs?"

She nodded, trying to even out her breathing as she snapped the cuffs on to Verde's arm.

We did it.

We _actually_ did it.

I stared in disbelief at the all-time super villain in Blaze's bleeding arms.

"You're not going to finish this you know," Verde smiled, his red blood making him look like a Christmas decoration with all of the green he was wearing.

"Wanna bet?" Blaze hissed into his ear.

"You really don't know?" Verde tried to laugh.

Blaze rolled her eyes, knowing this was one of the things the people in the cuffs said to intimidate their captor.

"She was right about you," Verde shook his head.

"Who was right about me?" Blaze stood him up, ready to make sure he ran into every painful rock on our way out of here.

"Take a wild guess, _Cinder_ella."

Blaze stared at him.

Where had I heard that name before?

"This _is_ the plan."

"To get caught?" I shook my head as I used the opening of the cave to give me signal to call for our transport.

He raised his eyebrows, and I suddenly got sick as I thought about it.

Verde wasn't a dumb man. He had been waiting for us, and he didn't try to run when he knew that his henchmen where going out.

He had a plan.

Some sort of plan.

But had we outsmarted it without realizing it?

Had we killed the henchmen that was supposed to help him out?

Had we set fire to the hangar where his transport waited?

Or was all Hades about to break loose?

"You're putting me out on the ledge?" Verde asked as Blaze shoved him over.

"Jump if you want," Blaze offered, and I turned on my Bluetooth while she continued to talk to Verde.

"We got him. We're getting out," I said into the small device, "Repeating we're out."

But no answer.

I was about to call again on the Bluetooth when I heard a sickening creak of a metal door falling over that made me run from the cave overlook to see what was going on in the other room.

"No you're not."

Liza.

Was it even Liza?

She didn't look like the beautiful girl I had known for so long.

Her blonde hair was jagged from swipes at her from a knife and had blood caked in. Her clothes were devoured in blood and dirt, and she looked so tired. And the Liza I knew had never really worked a day in her life.

But then a smile played across her lips that showed that this _was_ Liza as she pulled at something that wasn't visible from where I stood.

No_, someone_.

"Annabeth," I came closer to get at the bleeding blonde, who was only moments away from passing out on the cave floor.

"No closer," Liza held a gun to me, but I kept going.

I didn't care about me right now.

"It's her or me," Liza moved her gun to Annabeth's curls.

_Annabeth's gun._

The one I had given her.

As I looked from Liza to Annabeth, I noticed what was in between.

Even from here, I could see the dark green ink of the tattoo.

Liza.

Liza _was_ his plan.

Annabeth mouthed, _I'm sorry_, to me and Blaze.

But I could tell that it wasn't her fault.

Especially not with all of Liza's injuries.

It was kill Liza or save Annabeth, so I stopped in my tracks.

"Put away your gun."

I didn't move.

"_Do it_," Liza told me as she began to pull the trigger.

I dropped my gun.

"And the other one."

I ripped my shirt open to get at the holster, and I threw it down.

"Good boy," Liza smiled, "Now let's go make our trade."

She kept the gun on Annabeth's head as we walked to the overlook, where Blaze was looking out for the helicopter that was supposed to come to pick Verde up.

"Let him go, _Cinder_ella," Liza smirked at her twin sister.

Liza spun around, almost pushing Verde over the edge in the process to see the person who had first said _Cinderella_.

The one who had taught it to Verde.

"Liza," Blaze couldn't seem to be able to decide which emotion to focus on.

Anger.

Betrayal.

Shock.

Or even sisterly loyalty, if they even had any of that.

Verde's lips formed a smile, and Blaze looked between Annabeth, me, and Verde.

A good agent would have let Annabeth die.

But Annabeth was Blaze's second mother, the only one she had left.

Still keeping her gun on her belt, Blaze moved Verde for the trade.

"Do it, Amelia!" Liza snapped, moving her finger back to pull the trigger.

"Okay!" Blaze yelled to stop her, shoving Verde towards Liza, and Liza shoved Annabeth towards me, making her fall in the process.

Blaze and I rushed towards Annabeth, but both of our heads shot up when we could hear the helicopter coming closer.

Annabeth tried to say something, but she was too weak.

"This is our ride," Liza smiled, almost laughing as she moved around Verde's torn shirt to see the rest of the tattoo on his chest.

_Me Encanta Elizabeth._

Blaze stared at the three words in disbelief.

Leaving me to try to get Annabeth to see through her concussion, Blaze stood up, angry.

"What the hell, Elizabeth?"

Liza rolled her eyes.

In her eyes, her sister was behind once again.

"You know what, I'm actually happy Mom is dead right now. Because Annabeth has helped raise you for the last three years, and you did _that_. Imagine what you'd do to your own mother!" she screamed, her voice verging on hysterics, "For what?"

"Admit it you're jealous once again, _Ash."_

"Jealous?"

"You've _always_ been jealous of me because you were a freak!"

"Jealous? You think I wanted to be _normal_? To be _mediocre?_ My hair starts fire, and what can you do? Shoot people? Anything else?"

Liza's eyes narrowed at her sister, and Verde tightened his arm around her waist to keep her from doing anything crazy.

"I think its time we leave the little spies," Verde laughed as the helicopter approached and maneuvered into the helicopter skillfully.

"We'll kill you."

"For what? I'm retiring," Verde smiled, and I couldn't help but look away from Annabeth.

We'll never find him.

Not really.

Maybe twenty years from now, but it won't matter then. The Agency won't give him the punishment he deserves for his crimes once new crimes have been committed by a new head boss.

They've known where he was.

But they were going to put it together to kill him the right way, but he decided to retire.

The Agency had to snap him up before he did it.

Because, when you retire, you leave it all behind.

You never come back, and no one ever comes to find you. It's just you and some girl and all of your money in some secluded island all their own.

Verde was free.

He had outsmarted the Agency…

I watched in disbelief as Verde got on the helicopter with Liza.

We knew that villains got off. That they sometimes got away scuff free. That the Agency's efforts weren't always enough. That sometimes we lost.

But I had never lost.

Not like this.

I had never seen a murder get away and know that I wasn't going to get him one day.

"Don't bother trying to track us. She doesn't have much time left," Verde peaked his head out of the door and laughed as he nodded towards Annabeth. With a slam, he closed the door, and the helicopter began to fly away.

"Thirty."

I looked down to Annabeth, pushing her blood-covered hair out of her eyes.

"Thirty minutes."

And then her eyes closed.

Thirty minutes.

I had thirty minutes.

…or she was dead.

Through the outlook, I could see the helicopter fast approaching us, prepared to bring the infamous Verde in and ready to be disappointed.

I mentally began to think it over.

If we went after Verde, Annabeth would die before we could do anything.

If we helped her, we would lose Verde forever.

"It's Annabeth or Verde. We've got to get him," I began to cry, "It's about the mission."

"Not this time."

I looked up to Blaze.

"He's spending the rest of his life with my sister, that's enough punishment. I'm not losing another mom."

"Thank you, Blaze."

* * *

><p><strong>A Week Later,<strong>

_I stood alone as the priest continued._

_I could see the groups that had formed out of the corner of my eye._

_Her family was huddled together and crying._

_Her friends were staring at the casket, unable to believe it was her._

_Her siblings were staring at me._

_They knew she had done it, that I hadn't been able to control her._

_But they were blaming me, all of them._

_It was the only way not to break down, to have someone to put all of the guilt upon. To be able to scream that I had taken her, that I was the reason she wasn't with them at that very moment. It was the only thing that was keeping them sane._

_It was the only thing that kept them from being like me._

_The priest said the final words, and we were all excused as the casket was buried._

_People stayed around, crying and saying their final goodbyes to her._

_But I just stayed there, frozen._

_And, even once they had all gone, I couldn't move._

_But I couldn't hold in forever._

_The pain consumed me like a fire, and I fell to the grass, unable to believe that she was below me. That she was _dead_. That she was in the Trails, that I would never get to do all of the things I had wanted to do with her._

_To get married._

_To have kids._

_To finally escape the Agency that held us in such a painful icy grip._

_I felt my sanity leak out of me with every passing tear, and the pain worsened with every second._

_There was no escaping it._

_I could feel my last three sane words pass through my lips as I realized her old camp necklace._

"_I love you, Annabeth."_

I woke with a start, keeping my eyes closed.

_When you open your eyes, she'll be fine. She will open her sleepy grey eyes and ask you what you dreamed about_, I told myself.

But when I opened my eyes, she wasn't sleeping beside me. She didn't open her sleepy grey eyes and push her messy blonde hair behind her ear. She didn't pull herself up to ask me what my nightmare was about, and she wouldn't calm me down when I told her.

Annabeth was still in a coma in the hospital bed across the room from me.

We had gotten her here as soon as we could, but she hadn't recovered like they wanted her to. She was still on life support after a week.

Everyone kept telling me that she could wake up at any time.

But the truth was that she _hadn't._

She _could_ wake up.

But she _hadn't_.

And I began to worry that she wouldn't.

For the last few days, I had been non-stop imagining my life without her.

I couldn't do anything without her.

From the simple things like getting up in the morning to being able to go to work without thinking about the mission that claimed Annabeth's life.

I just couldn't do it.

I tried to lie.

I tried to tell myself that I had done it before. That I had lived without Annabeth for ten years and that I had only lived with Annabeth for a few months. I tried to tell myself that I could just go back to normal and become the perfect Agent I used to be.

But I _wasn't_ the perfect Agent anymore.

Annabeth had pushed past that perfect Agent, Noah Harrison, and she had pulled out the person underneath, Percy Jackson. The one that loved her more than anything and couldn't do anything without her.

"Mr. Harrison?"

I jumped and craned around to see the nurse at the door.

"Uh, yeah," I stood up quickly.

"We got her test results back. She's doing better."

But she hasn't woken up yet.

"Thanks," I nodded.

"She'll wake up soon," the nurse tried.

"You don't know that."

"And you don't know she _won't._"

I felt my eyes water as I nodded.

"Thank you."

The nurse nodded and disappeared back through the hospital before I could say anything else.

I sat back on the chair, and I stared at Annabeth.

Finally, I lowered my head. And I _prayed_.

I prayed to every god, including the minors, a true prayer. I prayed that Annabeth would be able to scream at me and be so angry that she could just kill me again. She could never speak to me again, but I didn't care as long as she was alive. I would trade in my job, which I've come to love, for her safety. I never wanted her getting this job. It was too dangerous.

The agency hadn't been busy for a while, and neither of us had been in danger. I had been so thankful of that until the day I got this assignment. I had been working there since the day when I was eighteen and they brought me here. I wasn't given a choice for the last ten years, but, once that was up, I was given a choice. But I didn't take it. My job was all I had in my life at that point.

On my eighteenth birthday, I stayed up until midnight, talking to Annabeth on the phone. When she hung up, claiming her dorm advisor would be pissed if Annabeth didn't, I told her I'd call her that morning, but I never got the chance. I fell asleep, and I woke up in a metal room with a table and a woman in her mid-twenties sitting at the other side. She told me about what happened. She told me what would happen in my future, and I hated it all. I fought for a year, wanting to get back to Annabeth and my old life. Then, I saw Annabeth again. It was from a distance while I was on a mission, and I realized she was better without me. My job gained me some enemies, and I couldn't live with myself if I put her in danger.

So, I let go. I worked until I was the best at my job, and the agency began to trust me, giving me the option to move out of the safe-house if I wanted to, but I didn't. I worked in the dangerous cities for years until I was given a promotion down south. I would work higher class cases and get a higher paycheck. So, I moved down to a nice, quiet beach in North Carolina. Surprisingly, the agency was run out of there, and, even better, they paid all of my expenses and for the million dollar beach house on the shore.

No one could recognize me as Percy Jackson. My usual green eyes were chocolate brown, and I dressed completely differently. My Bieber-like black hair was also brown and perfectly cropped, reminding me of a teacher I knew at the agency. Everything about me was different, except for the tattoo on my arm and the scar on my back from the Achilles Heel.

But I didn't look like that now. All of the brown had been washed out of my hair until I had pitch black hair again, and I hadn't gotten around to cutting it in a while. I took out my contacts, and I was wearing a Camp Half-Blood tee shirt. I felt like Percy Jackson, not my alias Noah Harrison.

For the last five years, I hadn't cared that I didn't even know the name of the place I worked for and was forced to call it the 'agency'. I hadn't cared that I spent just about every night alone. I hadn't cared that I hid my pictures of when I was Percy Jackson in my closet under a bunch of sweaters I hate.

I simply didn't care.

Then I got a new partner…

And she changed everything.

"Percy?"

My eyes flew open in the middle of a prayer to Artemis, and I was paralyzed.

"You're awake."

Annabeth tried to pull herself up, but her arms gave out, leaving her laying on the bed like before.

I jumped up and ran to her, crying from joy.

"You're okay," I basically made it impossible for her to breathe as I hugged her, but Annabeth wrapped her arms around my neck and hugged me back.

"What happened?" Annabeth tried to talk, but it sounded more like a croak.

And then her logic came back to her.

"You let him go?" it was supposed to be a question, but it sounded more like a statement.

I nodded yes.

"But-but how?"

I hesitated for a long moment.

"I broke the rules," I entwined my hand with hers, and she stared at me.

"We're never going to find him?"

I shook my head, and Annabeth nodded as she thought it over.

Finally, she squeezed my hand.

"I love you, Percy."

I smiled to myself.

"I love you, too, Annabeth," I kissed the top of her head.

Annabeth's smile widened.

"But don't you _ever_ do that to me again," I whispered, and Annabeth laughed.


	17. End of File

**I was dumb and named the kid Gabe. So, his name is now Zeke.**

* * *

><p><em>Fifteen Years Later…<em>

I typed in the code to the gate quickly, knowing it by heart, and I couldn't help but use every reflective surface in sight to see if someone could see what I was typing into the gate.

It had been eight years since I had been in the Agency, but old habits die hard.

During the six months I had off to recover from the injuries Liza had given me in the Caves, I had thought long and hard about what I wanted to do. Both quitting and staying made sense, and it had taken me the entire half of a year to decide if I was ready to make my leave permanent or if I wanted to go back to the life I knew so well.

And I finally decided to go back in, no matter how many times Percy reminded me of the danger.

Things were back to normal for a while, I guess.

We never spoke about Verde, or Liza, and we understood that there was no use trying to find them again.

But the near death experience made us realize that we didn't have a lot of time to make amends for our mistakes.

So, Percy Jackson came back from being missing.

Not officially of course.

He was still wanted by the branches that had formed when Verde had stepped down as their leader.

But he got back in touch with his mother and his family, and of course Grover. And, almost immediately, Percy fit back in with our friends and his family like not a day had gone by.

Things seemed like they couldn't get any better, but they could and _did_.

The beginning of the end of my career came in the fashion of a diamond engagement ring.

Marriage was the last thing on my mind. I was a busy Agent that barely had enough time to _date_ Percy, much less settle down with him. And, considering we had been together for _five months_ and Percy had made a rule about waiting until at least a year, I especially never thought that Percy was thinking about it.

Which is why it was such a shock when Percy got down on one knee.

Looking back on it, it _was_ the perfect time to propose. We were sitting out by the beach, looking at the moon's reflection on the ocean's dark water. The breeze was there but not too strong, and everything was absolutely perfect. But at the time, it had seemed completely random when Percy had proposed.

I accepted anyway, and we got married at Camp, with him looking like _Percy_ not Noah.

_Beeeeeep._

The gate opened, and I drove through the estate's long driveway to pull into the secure garage.

I ignored the groceries Percy had sent me out for and went for the important cargo in the backseat.

"I got it, Mommy," Zeke told me as he unclicked his seat belt and started to climb out.

Percy and I had never really discussed having children.

With everything I had been through, we had both assumed that my body wouldn't be able to handle conceiving much less the nine months of pregnancy.

So, when I had been feeling sick a lot, we just thought I had a stomach bug or something.

But, one day about seven years ago, I fell down and sprained my ankle. Percy took me to the doctor, and he asked me if I was pregnant before we took the X-Rays. I told him that I wasn't, but he persisted to make sure that I wasn't and made me take a test. Percy and I think about that too much though.

Instead, we were talking about how horrible work would be if my foot was broken.

So, no words can describe our surprise when the doctor came back smiling with the good news that I was pregnant.

At first, Percy and I had been excited that I was pregnant since we had thought it would never happen.

But then we found out how far along I was with the baby, and Percy suddenly started thinking about the last month when I had been pregnant without us knowing.

In his eyes, by letting me do all of those dangerous things, he was endangering the life of our unborn child, and nothing would sooth him after that.

And it didn't take long before I suddenly got scared for our child.

Not about what Percy was scared about though.

I was worried about what happened _after_ the baby was born.

All of those people we had angered. All of the revenge that could be taken out on our child.

Percy and I quit immediately, and we moved far away from anything dangerous for the sake of our son.

And, when Ezekiel had been born, the fears had worsened in both of us.

We had planned on naming him something from our family or for an agent that we owed our life to, but we had changed our minds immediately when we first held him. Zeke was our little angel, with his curly blonde hair and bright green eyes. He was so perfect… so _innocent_.

Our innocence had been stolen so long ago that Percy and I were determined to make sure Ezekiel kept his for as long as possible.

"Okay, Ezekiel," I told my six year old son as I picked up his green backpack and followed him into the house.

Percy and I weren't the only ones who had gotten scared about our unborn child and decided to run away to some secluded spot.

There was basically a village of it here in _Oak Groves_, a small town that harbored these retired Agent's mansions. The town didn't know, they thought we were just rich people who liked to stay quiet. The Oak Groves kids weren't exactly too welcoming to the Agency children, but the Agency kids had each other and they were perfectly happy with that.

When we had bought this house, it was just the frame of a mansion with nothing else inside.

Percy and I bought it, and we gave the contractor until the end of my pregnancy to finish it all. He said it would take longer, but I guess when there is an intimidating pregnant woman checking in on you every now and then it makes you work faster.

By the time everything was ready and we were moved in, it was a week before Ezekiel was born.

Zeke had made this a home.

And he had me and Percy believing that.

But there were still times, like when the security system would be taken down for an hour every now and then for check-ups, that we remembered what it really was.

Somewhere to hide. Somewhere to stay safe.

I clicked the lock on the garage while Zeke wasn't looking, and I shut the door behind me.

Ezekiel was a smart little kid, I guess he has to be with who is his grandmother is. He had never really asked me why I locked doors all the time, but I was in no place to take the chance of him asking.

But Zeke wouldn't have noticed anyway.

Not when he saw who was in the kitchen.

"Daddy!"

Percy and I still worked for the Agency technically, but we were consultants, nothing really.

But it kept us from going crazy from nothing to do.

Percy had flown to North Carolina to see Anna for something important, and he hadn't gotten back until a little while after I had dropped Zeke off for school.

"Ezekiel!" Percy got down on his knees to hug our son.

"When did you get home?" Ezekiel asked hurriedly.

He was definitely Daddy's Boy.

"This morning. I tried to be here before you left for school, but my flight was late," Percy pushed his curly blonde hair out of his eyes.

He kind of looked like a mash-up of me and Percy, becoming his own person.

But, to me, he will always look like Percy.

"Mommy?" Ezekiel looked back at me, "You knew Daddy was home."

"Daddy wanted to surprise you," I quickly pushed all of the blame to Percy as I put Ezekiel's backpack by the doorframe, where it would probably stay until morning since Zeke always finished his homework at school.

Percy looked up at me while Zeke wasn't looking and shook his head, making a motion that he'd kill me later.

"Hey, you told me on the phone you finished the boat with Etta. Can I see it?" Percy smiled at our son, and Ezekiel quickly nodded.

"I'll go get it."

Before I could even tell him, _"Don't run in the house_," Ezekiel was gone, up the stairs to his room.

Percy, still smiling stood up and started walking towards me.

"Anna says hello by the way."

"How is she?"

It had been five years since I had last seen Anna, when she had dropped by to see Ezekiel. Or, at least, she said she wanted to meet Zeke, but she had really just wanted to see if, now that he had been born, our worries had drifted away and we were ready to come back to the Agency in some way other than the small way we were in now. She wanted us to get on the plane with her, to bring Ezekiel back to our old lives.

When I had denied, reminding her of the love she felt for her son and telling her that Zeke wasn't safe like Tony had been there, it was like all contact between Anna and me had been severed.

"Good. She talked about Tony a lot, he's pretty much all grown up now."

"She wants us to come back, doesn't she?"

"She even went as far as to offer her son as a free babysitter for his last two years of high school."

I hesitated.

"Do you want to go back?" I asked as I pulled myself to sit on the kitchen countertop.

Percy had always been better at this than me.

At keeping the secret from our son.

At working from home.

At being _normal._

I liked it some of the time, but, for the rest, I was just forcing myself to keep it going and to not go completely insane out of boredom.

Percy thought it over.

It was tempting.

_So_ tempting.

To go back to the life that we had loved and still have the life with our son that we loved.

"It's not worth it," Percy finally shook his head, "Ezekiel's more important."

I nodded in agreement.

"It was always about the mission."

"Not always."

Percy rested his hand on top of mine.

_Not always._

Percy had never broken the rules in the Agency.

He had gone by the book, despite how many times he could-and probably _should_- have gone against them.

But he had broken them once.

He had broken them for me.

Verde had been the biggest threat the Agency had honestly ever seen, and we were so close to catching him. It was our last chance to ever get that SOB in custody, and Percy knew it. But it had been either we catch Verde or I live.

He was supposed to catch Verde and taken the risk that the paramedic on board could keep me alive.

But he didn't.

He informed the pilot that Verde was too far gone, along with Agent Elizabeth Dubois, to ever be found and that we had thirty minutes before we lost another Agent. And, when one of them tried to talk them into looking for Verde for a quick moment, Blaze backed him up, saying that it was pointless.

For the last fifteen years, it had been our secret.

We never told anyone what really happened that night.

We told a simple version.

Verde and Agent Elizabeth Dubois were partners. Liza was to help Verde escape into retirement. She captured and injured Agent Annabeth Chase. Using the captured Agent as a hostage, she got Verde free. The two then followed their plan to escape before the Agents were able to do anything about it.

There were attempts to track them for years.

Occasionally, we'd find them.

Like getting images of Liza buying a bouquet of flowers at a French market.

Verde getting a tattoo in New York.

Or small things like that.

By the time we got there to check it out, they were gone without a trace.

After five years, when Verde had leaked the image of Liza being six months pregnant and buying baby clothes, we knew that he would tighten up security even more for his new daughter to be born. And it was time that the Agency finally call quits on finding Verde and focus on our current problems instead of the past.

Everyone had forgotten about it, except for the three of us really.

Blaze, while never being able to forgive her sister, did miss her though.

And she hated that she'd never get to meet her niece even more.

I smiled to myself as Percy kissed my cheek.

"When's Blaze getting here with Etta?"

I was about to answer when the doorbell rang.

"That's Blaze."

"I'll go answer the door," Percy nodded, and I watched him go.

When he returned, four more people had been added to the one who had walked away.

Zeke and Etta, being only two years apart in age, quickly started talking.

And then there was Blaze and Viviane.

"Uncle Percy, we want to show you how the boat works!" Etta, well Henrietta I should say, tugged on Percy's shirt, giggling like only a four year old can.

Henrietta was Blaze's step daughter.

Calvin London, Blaze's husband of two years, had been her high school sweet heart. She got stationed in Europe since she had spent half of her life there, and he was in California. So, it quickly fell apart.

Cal had a daughter, Henrietta after the agent that had saved his life and brought him to the Agency, and he became single dad when she was only three months old. He gave up being an active Agent and moved to the head of operations in North Carolina.

Blaze got promoted to take my old job in North Carolina, and the rest was history.

She renounced her active agent status when she married Calvin, and they moved here when Viviane was two months old.

If you saw them together, you'd honestly wouldn't think they were family.

Etta was Hispanic with long silky black hair.

Blaze was a fire red head with pale skin.

Calvin still had the body of a twenty-two year old.

And Viviane had used the powers of genetics to look like a reincarnation of her grandmother, only with brown eyes.

But they were one of the happiest families I'd ever seen.

"Alright," Percy nodded towards Etta, and she happily pulled him off with Zeke to go out to the pool to test the toy boat they had built. Blaze rocked the six month old in her arms as she came to stand by me.

"Can I talk to you for a second, Annabeth?"

"Sure," I told her hesitantly, wondering what was making her so nervous, "Go at it."

"No, not here. Up there."

My face fell. She meant _the office_.

I nodded quickly, and I followed after the redhead as she went up the stairs and stopped in the office closet.

She didn't mean the office that was here for show.

She meant my real office.

I quickly typed in the code, and the secret panel opened.

Blaze set Viviane down in the crib I had put up for Zeke all those years ago but hadn't taken apart.

And I met her at my desk.

"I want you to see this," Blaze began to type so rapidly that I couldn't tell where she even was.

After a few clicks, she pushed the seat back to let me see.

It was… a family.

A little girl with blonde hair. A woman holding her hand and pushing her tortoise shell sunglasses back on. And a man holding a three year old little boy.

And then I noticed the green ink that the woman's expensive wrap dress could not hide.

I gasped.

"You found them…"

Verde.

Liza.

Their kids.

She found them.

"I did some digging. They go by Katherine Catalina," she pointed to her sister, "Mila," she pointed towards the little girl, "Ashton," she pointed at the baby boy, "And Devon."

Her hand hesitated before she stopped gesturing towards Verde.

I continued to stare.

The girl, she was about Ezekiel's age.

"They moved back to his home of Spain. They've lived there since Mila was born. They think Verde is some blue-blood or something."

Blaze's brown eyes softened.

"This was taken on Mila's tenth birthday."

Verde.

The reason that I was so worried about the safety of my son.

"What should we do?" Blaze finally asked.

We were still Agents.

We were still bound to do our duty to protect and serve the Agency.

This was the break-through they had been looking around for as of fifteen years ago.

But there was something about seeing them all there.

They suddenly weren't the kids who had screwed us over. Liza wasn't the bitch who had taken me hostage and almost killed me. Verde wasn't the villain who had used us all to get at his objective, not caring if we died along the way.

They were… _a family_.

Somehow, they didn't feel like the two most hated traitors.

…They were just the Catalina's.

Liza and Verde had faded back to create new people.

And, even if they hadn't, I realized I was like them.

So maybe I had a different past, but I was still hiding my children from the wrath from it.

Unbelievably, I was the same as Verde.

"What do you mean? This isn't them."

"What?" Blaze looked at me like I was insane.

"This is Katherine Catalina," I pointed to Liza, "Mila," I pointed towards the child, "Ashton," I pointed to the baby, and my finger rested on the face of Verde.

The face that had tried to kill me.

The one that had tried to kill Percy, who meant everything to me.

…_the mission._

"And Devon."

Blaze's eyes widened with understanding.

"You're right. Just a family from Spain. I was mistaken."

The mission.

At the end of the day it_ is_ all about the mission.

My mission was once staying alive after running away when I was seven.

My mission was once starting over with my father, which was one of the hardest things I've ever done.

My mission was once standing by Percy's side no matter what.

My mission was once to mend a broken heart that could only be soothed by Perseus Jackson.

My mission had been to be remain faithful to the Agency.

…But my mission was to now take care of my son.

The Agency could do whatever they wanted.

I didn't care about Liza or Verde anymore. They were wanted by the Agency, not me.

I had finally completed the hardest mission I had ever gone through to be able to be at a point where I can truly say that Ezekiel is my number one priority.

I wasn't an agent anymore.


End file.
